Snuffing Radical Islam's Fire

Much better than the usual drivel.

Just as Saddam Hussein was a handy punching bag for U.S. fury over Osama bin Laden, Yasser Arafat had, long before his death, become a convenient scapegoat for failures in Western diplomacy over the 50-year-old Palestinian tragedy. We just don't get it, and we better soon.

The relationship between the Palestinians and the rise of Al Qaeda, between Arafat and the rise of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, needs to be deconstructed. Our whole "war on terror" (and of terror) will continue to be quixotic, if not self-destructive, if we don't take the opportunity of the Palestinian Authority president's death to set a new course, not based on a personality but on history and the needs of the region. At least a pinch of the salt of our own ideals in the soup of the Mideast wouldn't hurt either. And I don't mean force-fed "democracy."

I met Arafat in Beirut on the brink of the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982, the event Bin Laden referred to — with portent few caught — in his missive to the West just before the U.S. presidential election.

I didn't know it at the time, but I was following in the footsteps of my father-in-law, Robert Rogers, who was the first major network reporter (NBC) to interview Arafat. He was also the first network documentary producer to openly criticize the Vietnam War ("It's a Mad, Mad War," 1964), a courageous trait I'd like to see more of today.

LA Times

In October, one of the 9/11 commissioners, John Lehman, spoke at Pitzer College at a conference on the subject of 9/11 and the writer's imagination and conscience. He acknowledged that evil would not disappear from the Earth if the Palestinian-Israeli conflict were settled. But, wouldn't a whole lot of the oxygen be drained from Bin Laden's recruitment message if it were? Lehman agreed emphatically. Snuffing the "oxygen" of terror was the right metaphor, he said.

Go for it, President Bush. Save a lot of money and lives and sanity. You don't have to capture Bin Laden. Just make him quaint.

Unfortunately, the only faith I have in Mr. Bush rests in his endless capacity to screw things up more than they already are.

that bin laden ( I refuse to capitalize his name) couldnt give a rats ass about i/p...until recently. Seems with his leutenants decreased and some of his power gone, I think hes looking for any excuse to try to increase that power.

He's a fundy and an Arab chauvinist. While he may have focused on
other beefs, he has to care about all those "sacred shrines" and stuff
and all the Western invaders. I think his problem was more an antipathy
for secular-christian-compromiser types like the dear recently departed
Arafat or good old Hosni in Egypt, or Saddam. I've read that he and
Saddam hated each other. Of course, never having talked to either, it's
all hearsay to me.

at least since 2001.

http://archives.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/meast/10/22/gen.israel.laden/