20 February, 2007
Pentagon for attack on camps in N. Waziristan: NYT
The Pentagon has advocated direct US strikes against alleged Al Qaeda training camps inside North Waziristan where the terrorist group appears to have made new inroads, the New York Times reported on Monday.
The concern about a resurgent Al Qaeda has been the subject of intensive discussion at high levels of the Bush administration, the report said, and has reignited debate about how to address Pakistan's role as a haven for militants without undermining the government of President Pervez Musharraf.
The Pentagon, the report said, wanted direct US strikes against the camps, but others warned that any raids could result in civilian casualties.
“State Department officials say that increased American pressure could undermine President Musharraf's military-led government,” the report added.
Last week, President Bush's senior counterterrorism adviser, Frances Fragos Townsend, went to Afghanistan to consult security officials about rising US concerns on Al Qaeda's resurgence in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Quoting unnamed intelligence sources, the newspaper reported that Al Qaeda, the terrorist network led by Osama bin Laden, had established a new operating organization after being ousted more than five years ago from its safe haven in formerly Taliban-run Afghanistan.
Osama bin Laden’s deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, in particular appeared to be coordinating operations from North Waziristan, where the Pakistani government had little control, the report claimed.
The report identified several new Al Qaeda compounds in North Waziristan, including one that it said might be training operatives for strikes against targets beyond Afghanistan.American analysts told the newspaper that the compounds functioned under a loose command structure and were operated by groups of Arab, Pakistani and Afghan militants allied with Al Qaeda. They receive guidance from their commanders and Zawahri. Osama bin Laden, who has long played less of an operational role, appears to have little direct involvement.
The report said the training camps had yet to reach the size and level of sophistication of the Al Qaeda camps established in Afghanistan under Taliban rule. But groups of 10 to 20 men were being trained at the camps, the officials said, and the Al Qaeda infrastructure in the region was gradually becoming more mature.
As recently as 2005, American intelligence assessments described senior leaders of Al Qaeda as cut off from their foot soldiers and able only to provide inspiration for future attacks. But more recent intelligence describes the organization's hierarchy as intact and strengthening.
American officials and analysts said a variety of factors in Pakistan had come together to allow "core Al Qaeda leadership” to regain some of its strength. The emergence of a relative haven in North Waziristan and the surrounding area has helped senior operatives communicate more effectively with the outside world via courier and the Internet.
The newspaper said that investigation into last summer's failed plot to bomb airliners in London has led counterterrorism officials to what they say are "clear linkages" between the plotters and core Al Qaeda operatives in Pakistan. American analysts point out that the trials of terrorism suspects in Britain revealed that some of the defendants had been trained in Pakistan.
In a videotaped statement last year, Zawahri claimed responsibility for the July 2005 London suicide bombings. Included in the same tape was a statement by one of the London suicide bombers, pledging allegiance to Al Qaeda. Two of the four bombers travelled to Pakistan prior to the attack.
The NYT report said that some counter-terrorism experts question the seriousness of Pakistan's commitment to the fight against terror. They argued that elements of Pakistan's military still supported the Taliban and saw them as a valuable proxy to counter the rising influence of India.
Since 2001, members of various militant groups in Pakistan had increased their cooperation with one another in the tribal areas, the report said.
It quoted analysts as saying that North Waziristan became a hub of militant activity last year, after President Musharraf negotiated a treaty with tribal leaders in the area.
Officials told the newspaper that the United States still had little idea where Osama bin Laden and Zawahri had been hiding since 2001, but that the two men were not believed to be present in the camps currently operating in North Waziristan.
Pakistan should respond with full force if US makes intrusion.
The concern about a resurgent Al Qaeda has been the subject of intensive discussion at high levels of the Bush administration, the report said, and has reignited debate about how to address Pakistan's role as a haven for militants without undermining the government of President Pervez Musharraf.
The Pentagon, the report said, wanted direct US strikes against the camps, but others warned that any raids could result in civilian casualties.
“State Department officials say that increased American pressure could undermine President Musharraf's military-led government,” the report added.
Last week, President Bush's senior counterterrorism adviser, Frances Fragos Townsend, went to Afghanistan to consult security officials about rising US concerns on Al Qaeda's resurgence in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Quoting unnamed intelligence sources, the newspaper reported that Al Qaeda, the terrorist network led by Osama bin Laden, had established a new operating organization after being ousted more than five years ago from its safe haven in formerly Taliban-run Afghanistan.
Osama bin Laden’s deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, in particular appeared to be coordinating operations from North Waziristan, where the Pakistani government had little control, the report claimed.
The report identified several new Al Qaeda compounds in North Waziristan, including one that it said might be training operatives for strikes against targets beyond Afghanistan.American analysts told the newspaper that the compounds functioned under a loose command structure and were operated by groups of Arab, Pakistani and Afghan militants allied with Al Qaeda. They receive guidance from their commanders and Zawahri. Osama bin Laden, who has long played less of an operational role, appears to have little direct involvement.
The report said the training camps had yet to reach the size and level of sophistication of the Al Qaeda camps established in Afghanistan under Taliban rule. But groups of 10 to 20 men were being trained at the camps, the officials said, and the Al Qaeda infrastructure in the region was gradually becoming more mature.
As recently as 2005, American intelligence assessments described senior leaders of Al Qaeda as cut off from their foot soldiers and able only to provide inspiration for future attacks. But more recent intelligence describes the organization's hierarchy as intact and strengthening.
American officials and analysts said a variety of factors in Pakistan had come together to allow "core Al Qaeda leadership” to regain some of its strength. The emergence of a relative haven in North Waziristan and the surrounding area has helped senior operatives communicate more effectively with the outside world via courier and the Internet.
The newspaper said that investigation into last summer's failed plot to bomb airliners in London has led counterterrorism officials to what they say are "clear linkages" between the plotters and core Al Qaeda operatives in Pakistan. American analysts point out that the trials of terrorism suspects in Britain revealed that some of the defendants had been trained in Pakistan.
In a videotaped statement last year, Zawahri claimed responsibility for the July 2005 London suicide bombings. Included in the same tape was a statement by one of the London suicide bombers, pledging allegiance to Al Qaeda. Two of the four bombers travelled to Pakistan prior to the attack.
The NYT report said that some counter-terrorism experts question the seriousness of Pakistan's commitment to the fight against terror. They argued that elements of Pakistan's military still supported the Taliban and saw them as a valuable proxy to counter the rising influence of India.
Since 2001, members of various militant groups in Pakistan had increased their cooperation with one another in the tribal areas, the report said.
It quoted analysts as saying that North Waziristan became a hub of militant activity last year, after President Musharraf negotiated a treaty with tribal leaders in the area.
Officials told the newspaper that the United States still had little idea where Osama bin Laden and Zawahri had been hiding since 2001, but that the two men were not believed to be present in the camps currently operating in North Waziristan.
Pakistan should respond with full force if US makes intrusion.
18 February, 2007
It's Time To Visit Gaza
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is one area where liberals and neo-conservatives in America find common ground. From Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton all the way to George Bush and Condoleezza Rice one and all are united in supporting Israel's assault on the Palestinian people and their land.
The criticism of Jimmy Carter's book Palestine Peace Not Apartheid is a case in point. The hysteria on the Right is not worthy of repetition, but House Speaker Nancy Pelosi outdid herself by issuing a statement that: "It is wrong to suggest that the Jewish people would support a government in Israel or anywhere else that institutionalizes ethnically based oppression." Wrong to suggest? Here is something right to suggest: Madam Speaker, it is time for you to visit Gaza.
In The Tribes Triumphant, arguably one of the best books ever written about the Middle East, journalist Charles Glass describes children in Gaza on their way to school: "... little girls with white fringe collars, boys leading their younger brothers ... with canvas bags of books on their backs, hair brushed back and faces scrubbed ... Thousands and thousands of children's feet padding the dusty paths between their mother's front doors and their schools ... Beautiful youngsters so innocent that they could laugh even in Gaza."
Glass reveals that 56.6 percent of the 1.4 million people living in Gaza (if you can call it living) are under the age of 18. That means 792,400 children; Gaza has no cinemas, no theatres, no concert halls, and no space for entertainment or amusement. Where then do these children play? Israel controls all access to, from and within Gaza, never allowing these children to see the world outside this tiny crowded strip of sand they call home. If this, Madam Speaker, is not ethnically based oppression, what is?
"Gaza First" was the slogan that got the Oslo accords off the ground in the early 1990s. Today, as innocent, unarmed men, women and children in Gaza are imprisoned, starved and killed by Israel in broad daylight, its obvious that it, meaning the Oslo agreement, was another nail in the coffin of a just and lasting peace. Then came Sharon's Gaza disengagement, which was a disingenuous claim by Israel to make "concessions for peace". Pretending to pull out of Gaza for the sake of peace, Israel tightened the noose around Gaza and its people while freeing itself from any obligation for the welfare of the people of Gaza.
People call Gaza a hotbed of terror, neglecting, or perhaps refusing to see that people in Gaza are attempting, albeit in all futility, to resist the terror under which they are forced to live. Close to one million of Gaza's 1.4 million residents are refugees or descendents of refugees forced out of their homes from other parts of Palestine only to be imprisoned and impoverished in Gaza. In The Roadmap to Nowhere Tanya Reinhart writes: "Since 1967, 280,000 people in Gaza have passed through Israeli prisons, detention cells and interrogation rooms." The connection cannot be overlooked: Residents of Gaza have made a name for themselves in resisting the Israeli occupation of Palestine even before 1967 and they have paid dearly for this resistance.
On 11 December 2006 Jan McGirk described in The Independent the effects of Israeli terror on the children of Gaza: "No sane child can remain unaffected by the mayhem of Gaza Strip. Playmates frequently are killed or maimed: at last count, Israeli guns had slain 88 Gazan children and wounded another 343 between mid-June and December, 2006" She further writes that "In Gaza's grim conditions, mothers find it hard to tell if their offspring are crying out of fright, pain or misery. But when normally bickering brats fall silent, it's the first sign of mental scars from being constantly scared." She adds, "Muhammad, who would hit smaller children or shatter cups when he did not get his way, eventually revealed in an after school meeting that two IDF soldiers had executed a young man right in front of him."
In America people still speak of a "peace process", and the situation in Gaza and in the West Bank is characterized as a conflict between two people who can't find a fair compromise. Few dare to mention that the only process that is taking place is oppression for the sake of expansion. Palestinian children are imprisoned, traumatized, starved and murdered so that Israeli can maintain its hegemony over the: "Land of Israel".
Gaza is collateral damage, the children of Gaza are of no consequence and the leaders of the enlightened, democratic Western world could not care less. But in spite of its enormous military might Israel's authority over life in Gaza can be must be defied. People conscience must act so that the ethnically based oppression, of which House Speaker Pelosi says it is wrong to accuse Israel, must be brought to an end.
Miko Peled is an Israeli living in San Diego. He is the son of Israeli General Matityahu Peled.
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