Early this morning around 12:30 Israeli F-16 jets dropped bombs on the southern Lebonese city of Qana. In this attack a building housing refugees who had fled from earlier Israeli bombardment were targetted and the men, women and children sleeping in the basement of the building were killed when the Israeli bombs demolished the building. The dispropotionate use of firepower by the Israelis is causing universal concern and while the world waits for the US to rein in the Israelis the pace of r...
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert looks straight at the camera and says without a touch of irony that Israel is "fighting terrrism" in Lebanon. Two days ago marked the 60th anniversary of the terrrist attack on King David Hotel at Jerusalem carried out by the members of the Irgun Gang whosr leader Menachem Begin rose to be the Prime Minister of Israel. In fact the father of Israel's present Foreign Minister Ms Tzipi Livni was one of the chief members of this gang whose activities Washingto DC will t...
Isaac Deutcher, the Jewish historian whose entire family perished in the Holocaust made the following observation after the end of the 1967 six day war with the Arab states: "To justify or condone Israel's wars against the Arabs is to render Israel a very bad service and harm its own long term interests". This statement is relevant today as Israel in a blaze of military tiumphalim is close to achieving abbolute mastery over Lebanon. The unrestrained use of firepower, and the highly self right...
The humanitarian crisis caused by the unrestrained bombing of civilian targets in southern Lebanon and Beirut by Israeli fighter jets has been ignored by the world. Even the Arab nations which are quick to condemn every act of reppraisal by Israel have largely been silent. While the governments of the so-called moderate Arab states have remained prudently silent over the Israeli attacks on Lebanon, the opinion in the Arab streets is getting polorised and this is a dangerous trend. The respons...
The domestic debate over the setting of a timeline for the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq has been most instructive. On the one hand it dlearly demonstrated to the whole world that there is dwindling support for the war in Iraq and the Republicans barely managed to stave off defeat in the Senate because Democrats like Hilary Clinton went along with the majority. However we have not seen the end of the debate. The Democrats made acrucial tactical blunder by emphasing the timetable for troop...
In the bad old days of the Roman Empire, there was a territory that the Romans tried to conquer for nearly 200 years, but never quite succeded. Known as Parthia, this territory roughly corresponds to south western Afghanistan and parts of the Iranian plateau. USA is meeting stiff resistance in exactly the same region and surprisingly for the same reason--imperial overstretch. While Iraq is getting all the attention, the original war on terror centred on Afghanistan is not receiving adequa...
One of the more attractive features of the USA is the great institutions of higher learning that flourish all over the USA. It can be said that the USA has the world's best Universities and the largest number of Nobel Prize winners and a tradition of fearless criticism. The faculty teaching in the Universities are undoubtedly the most talented and on the whole involved in their research and teaching. A open society that respects dissent is cultivated in the classrooms and lecture halls. Unfo...
A few days back I got a bitter lesson in how divicive Jack Murtha has become to some conservatives. The fact remains that Rep Jacj Murtha has a track record of being pro military and is a ranking member of the Armed Forces Committee. Rep Murtha has served as the former chairman of the Defence Appropriations Sub Committee. He voted in favor of the War and when he realized that the war is only putting US soldiers to needless risk, Murtha has changed his mind. He is not a peacenik as some r...
The embedded journalists from the USA and UK are doing a great disservice to their own people by consciously hiding the untold suffering of the people of Iraq in the face of American occupation. The impact of the war and the insurgency have been devastating on women and children. It is really sickening to see fat well fed Iraqi men, Quislings all of them, appear on Western TV and mouth innanities about the great job that is being done by the coalition. The pictures from Basra put paid to such...
More tham 45 years ago Dr Henry Kissenger wrote a book which is more relevant today than it was in 1958 when Harvatrd University published it. Entitled [I ]Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy[/I ]this book argued the provocative thesis that the Westphalia System of having the State with its monopoly on the coercive power represented by the army and the like will not be the sole determinant of foreign policy in the nuclear age. Any state attempting to change the international status quo will pe...
The third Chife of Staff has taken charge at the White House. Josh Bolten, an old Texas hand, has worked as a policy analyst with George W Bush even when the junoir Buish was a Governor. His brief seems to be simple: make sure all the scandals of "Scooter Libby, Karl Rove and the CIA leajk case, are all pushed under the carpet and ensure a smooth sailing for the present President.. The Republicans are scared that come November they would lose control over Congress and with a Democratic House ...
A powerful neoconservative voice has risen against the prophet of neoconservatism--George Bush. Francis Fukuyama, known all over the world for his provocative and yes, celebratory thesis about the end of history, has written a withering attack on Bush and the betrayal of the neoconservative agenda. The carapace of ideas such as preventive war,benevolent hegemony, war against terror are analysed and critiqued in great detail in thois booik. When the Iraq Qar was attacked on humanitarian and s...
The Chairman of the House International Relations Committee, a ranking member of the Republican Party has in a recent speech made the following observations: Our Power, then has the grave liability of rendering our theories about the world immune from failure. But by becoming deaf to easily discerned warning signs, we may ignore the long term costs that result from our actions and dismiss reve...
The situation in Iraq is nowhere near normal. Three years after the Bush Admionistration launched its invasion of Iraq the country has been reduced to shambles. Electricity is supplies for only 4 to 6 hoiurs, schools and hospitals are virtually closed down, essential suppl\ies are to be had at an exhorbitant price and a proud and civilised nation reduced to sectarian and civil strife. The US invasion is the sole cause for this unfolding trgedy. The regular readers of our blog would kno...
In his extremely perceptive bvook India's Nuclear Bomb, George Perkovitich has documented in telling detail the long and covert road to nuclearization in India. Right fro the start of her nuclear research in the early i950,s the civillian uses of nuclear technology has only been a fascade for carrying out a covert programme of weaponisation. The sanctimonious humbug that a developing country needs nuclear energy for meeting its ever increasing demands for electricity was first trotted out by ...