From http://OpinionJournal.com

Best of the Web Today - December 21, 2001
By JAMES TARANTO
Our Friends the Saudis  http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20011221-17924224.htm

The Pentagon has conducted "a more leisurely review" of the Osama bin Laden videotape, the Associated Press reports. One of the translators, George Michael, says the new translation came up with "a whole bunch of names." He lists three of them: Nawaq Alhamzi, Salem Alhamzi and Wail Alshehri, all of whom were among the Sept. 11 hijackers.

ABC News  http://abcnews.go.com/sections/wnt/WorldNewsTonight/OBLtape_missing011220.html  and  CNN  http://www.cnn.com/2001/US/12/20/ret.bin.laden.translation/index.html  have both commissioned their own translations of the tape. ABC reports:

*** QUOTE ***

The new translation uncovers statements that could be embarrassing to the government of Saudi Arabia, a very important U.S. ally. Bin Laden's visitor, Khalid al Harbi, a Saudi dissident, claims that he was smuggled into Afghanistan by a member of Saudi Arabia's religious police.

He also tells bin Laden that in Saudi Arabia, several prominent clerics--some with connections to the Saudi government--made speeches supporting the attacks on America.

"Right at the time of the strike on America, he gave a very moving speech, Sheikh Abdulah al Baraak," bin Laden said on the tape. "And he deserves thanks for that."

Sheikh al Baraak, to whom the visitor refers, is a professor at a government university and a member of an influential council on religious law.

*** END QUOTE ***

CNN says that bin Laden identifies nine of the 19 hijackers, and that at least one of the Saudi clerics whose names were omitted from the official translation "was possibly a government official."

Meanwhile, the  New York Times  http://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/21/international/middleeast/21SAUD.html  (link requires registration) reports Saudi officials are griping about a "slanderous campaign" against them in the American media: "In trying to smooth over any disagreements, officials from both countries have found it convenient to blame the press, but in Saudi Arabia that blame has been particularly pointed at what most Saudis interpret to be a Jewish lobby that controls the American media."

A Stand Against Pakistani Terror  http://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/21/international/asia/21PREX.html

Although Pakistan is a nominal ally in the war against Islamic terrorists, President Bush is freezing the assets of Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Pakistani terrorist group believed to have been behind last week's attack on the Indian Parliament. "Mr. Bush portrayed his action as one intended to support both India and Pakistan's president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, a key ally in the war in Afghanistan," the New York Times reports. But  Agence France-Presse  http://www.hindustantimes.com/nonfram/211201/dlfor57.asp  quotes Mahmood Ghazi, Pakistan's minister for religious affairs, as saying "the freezing of accounts could be the result of some misunderstanding about Lashkar-e-Taiba."

The Times quotes a "senior aide" as saying of the freezing: "We would be hypocritical if we didn't do it." Charges of hypocrisy have already been heard in the Indian press. Under the headline "Double Standards Inc.,"  Outlook India  http://www.outlookindia.com/full.asp?fname=powell&fodname=20011221&sid=1  rehearses a series of quotes from Secretary of State Colin Powell. Sample: "We hope that India will share all the information that they have acquired concerning this tragedy in their parliament building in New Delhi with the Pakistanis, who have condemned the attack and are anxious to cooperate with us, with our FBI."

The Hindu  http://www.hinduonnet.com/stories/2001122101110100.htm , an Indian newspaper, reports that another Pakistani terror group, Jaish-e-Mohammad, has threatened to carry out attacks in major Indian cities which, according to its spokesman, would be 'shocking.' " J-e-M, however, denies involvement in the Parliament attack. The  Daily Telegraph  http://www.portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2001/12/21/upaki.xml&sSheet=/portal/2001/12/21/ixport.html , meanwhile, reports India is recalling its ambassador to Islamabad and cutting off rail and bus links between the two countries.

Our Friends the Chinese  http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20011221-95780908.htm

"China continued to supply arms to Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda terrorist even after the group began the September 11 attack on America," the Washington Times reports, citing a "senior U.S. official":

*** QUOTE ***

The official said that a week after the terrorist attack, the ruling Taliban and the al Qaeda fighters embedded among them, received a shipment of Chinese-made SA-7 missiles. The shoulder-fired anti-aircraft weapons are similar to the U.S. Stinger.

*** END QUOTE ***

The official, who apparently has a gift for understatement says, as the Times puts it, that "the shipment raises serious questions about Beijing's pledge to help fight terrorism."

The Hunt Goes On  http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2001/12/21/wpak21.xml&sSheet=/news/2001/12/21/ixnewstop.html

The Telegraph reports that "the Pakistani army fought with escaped al-Qa'eda prisoners for a second day yesterday as the government intensified the hunt for Osama bin Laden and his associates in its own tribal areas." The report adds:

*** QUOTE ***

Afghan border officials told The Telegraph that hundreds of Arabs, who had fled into the Paracinar area after the fall of Tora Bora had doubled back into the mountains of eastern Afghanistan.

The al-Qa'eda fighters were said to have massed at important terrorist bases in Paktia province, which is just south of Ningahar province, the site of the Tora Bora mountain redoubt.

*** END QUOTE ***

The  Washington Times  http://www.washtimes.com/national/20011221-2457690.htm  reports that restrictive rules of engagement have kept U.S. special-operations troops from firing on some al Qaeda terrorists:

*** QUOTE ***

A senior military official said the covert warriors must seek approval from U.S. Central Command before firing on people they identify as al Qaeda fighters trying to flee Afghanistan. The Americans are free to fire if they feel threatened or when raiding enemy compounds.

In communicating on secure radios through the chain of command, the commandos must "tell how many people there are, which way they are moving and why they think they are al Qaeda," said the source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

This official estimated that scores of al Qaeda tracked by U.S. troops have made it safely to Pakistan the past week because approval to fire was not given promptly or not given at all.

*** END QUOTE ***

What's Saddam Up To?  http://www.msnbc.com/news/676183.asp

MSNBC picks up a Vanity Fair report with "an alleged former brigadier general in Iraq's Mukhabarat intelligence service about the secret commando force which he said was trained in 'sabotage, urban warfare, hijacking and murder.' ":

*** QUOTE ***

According to Vanity Fair, defector Abu Zeinab al-Qurairy, whom it described as former close aide to Saddam Hussein's son Uday, administered a 1,200-strong commando force called "The Strikers." At Uday's orders, he told Vanity Fair, he put together a team of 30 "strikers" and gave them false identities with the aid of a corrupt official in the United Arab Emirates.

He told the magazine the group has vanished and could be anywhere. Al-Qurairy said he believed Iraq was involved in the Sept. 11 attacks carried out by teams that remained undercover for years in the west.

*** END QUOTE ***

James Robbins  http://www.nationalreview.com/contributors/robbins122101.shtml  argues in National Review Online that Saddam is in trouble:

*** QUOTE ***

He is beginning to understand that this time the United States means business. . . . This time the strategic correlation of forces is moving against him, slowly but with increasing momentum. The United States and its allies are flush with certain victory in Afghanistan. Saddam had no doubt counted on the same things al Qaeda had hoped for, a bloody ground struggle in which the United States would be humbled, Muslim solidarity against Crusaders and Jews, and anti-Western riots in major Middle Eastern cities. But not only did the Taliban turn out to be a paper tiger, Afghanistan has been a proving ground for a new American operational approach towards inconvenient regimes--isolate the target state diplomatically, build up the internal opposition, insert special forces, bring on the air power, dislodge the enemy's conventional forces, get them on the run, pummel them, send in the Marines, and let the opposition do the rest.

*** END QUOTE ***

Osama's Nukes?  http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20122001-044449-5310r

A pair of UPI dispatches report on the possibility that al Qaeda has nuclear weapons. The FBI is taking the possibility seriously, but key members of Congress disagree about the likelihood of a bin Laden bomb. "If you asked me if bin Laden really had these weapons, I would say, probably not, but, on the other hand, I wouldn't be the least surprised if there were a nuclear explosion in Israel or the United States," Rep. Chris Shays, a Connecticut Republican and chairman of the House subcommittee on national security, tells UPI. But the  second dispatch  http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20122001-044906-9007r  quotes Rep. Curt Weldon, the Pennsylvania Republican who chairs the Armed Services subcommittee on research and development: "The question is whether or not bin Laden has had access to nuclear material. I think it is better than a 50-50 chance that he does."

Our Friends the FAA  http://www.startribune.com/stories/1576/913687.html

The Minneapolis Star Tribune reports on the tip that led to the arrest of "20th hijacker" Zacarias Moussaoui. A flight instructor from the Pan Am International Flight Academy in the Twin Cities suburb of Eagan, Minn., became suspicious and called the FBI when Moussaoui enrolled in lessons to fly a jumbo jet. "Do you realize how serious this is?" the paper quotes the instructor as asking an FBI agent. "This man wants training on a 747. A 747 fully loaded with fuel could be used as a weapon!"

Here's the really eye-popping part of the report:

*** QUOTE ***

Besides alerting the FBI about Moussaoui, the school's Phoenix office called the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) early this year about another student--Hani Hanjour, who was believed to be the pilot of the plane that flew into the Pentagon on Sept. 11. The school had raised questions about Hanjour's limited ability to speak English, the universal language of aviation.

An FAA representative sat in on a class to observe Hanjour, who was from Saudi Arabia, and discussed with school officials finding an Arabic-speaking person to help him with his English.

*** END QUOTE ***

What's on That Ship?  http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/newsid_1723000/1723574.stm

British antiterrorism police are searching a cargo ship in the English channel, the BBC reports. The ship originated in the Indian Ocean island nation of Mauritius, and cops acted on "a credible tip-off" to seize the ship. A preliminary search didn't find anything, but "a second search which may take several days has now begun." Police say they're looking for "terrorist paraphernalia which was bin Laden-related," but they won't be more specific.

'I'm Fed Up With Being Called an Anti-Semite'  http://argument.independent.co.uk/regular_columnists/deborah_orr/story.jsp?story=111165

Deborah Orr, a columnist for London's left-wing Independent newspaper, writes a bizarre defense of France's ambassador to London, who, as we  noted yesterday  http://opinionjournal.com/best/?id=95001622#merde , writer Barbara Amiel quoted as making vulgar comments about Israel:

*** QUOTE ***

I'm getting fed up with being called an anti-Semite. And the more fed up I get, the more anti-Semitic I sound. If the likes of Ms Amiel continue to insist that everyone with a word to say against Israel is an anti-Semite, she is going to find one day that the world is once more divided neatly between anti-Semites and Jews.

That sounds like an anti-Semitic threat. It's not. It's the last thing I want. However, potential, but conditional, sympathisers are alienated so much by Zionist rhetoric that they start singing from what sounds like the same songsheet as the anti-Semite conspiracy theorists. Which I think is what has happened to the French ambassador. The only people who will be lathered into apoplexy by Mr Bernard's remarks are the very people who need to be keeping the coolest of heads right now. But Israelis, and the most committed of friends of Israel, are very far from doing that.

*** END QUOTE ***

Cashing in on 9/11  http://dailynews.yahoo.com/htx/nm/20011220/bs/attack_lawsuit_dc_1.html

Ellen Mariani, a New Hampshire woman whose husband was on the plane that hit 2 World Trade Center, is suing United Airlines, alleging that the airline "breached its duty to care for the safety of the passengers on Flight 175." She's represented by the Nolan Law Group, a Chicago firm so crass it has actually set up a  page  http://www.nolan-law.com/comm_disaster/commaviation12.html  on its Web site soliciting Sept. 11 clients. Mariani had previously been the subject of sympathetic profiles in the  Manchester (N.H.) Union Leader  http://www.theunionleader.com/articles_show.html?article=5429  and the  Daily Southtown  http://www.dailysouthtown.com/southtown/kadner/x30-pkd1.htm  of suburban Chicago. "I think Mrs. Mariani is using her battle for compensation as a form of therapy," Southtown columnist Phil Kadner wrote--before Mariani sued the airline.

Stupidity Watch

Some faculty members at California's  Orange Coast Community College  http://www.occ.cccd.edu/  are defending Muslim students who lied in an effort to get a professor fired,  The Weekly Standard  http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/000/713pprrb.asp  reports. As we  noted last week  http://opinionjournal.com/best/?id=95001603#hearlson , a tape of Kenneth Hearlson's class proved Hearlson was innocent of the charge of making bigoted remarks. Now the Standard reports that "24 instructors from departments ranging from English to Interior Design" have signed a petition saying: "We believe there is a strong possibility that Ken Hearlson exercised poor judgement [sic] in class, going beyond 'shock teaching' to create a hostile environment in class"--never mind that he's been proved innocent.  P. Kevin Parker  http://www.occ.cccd.edu/%7Ekparker/ , an English professor who signed the petition, tells the Standard: "The four students who raised complaints were !
fa!
ctually wrong in their accusations. However, they were inferentially correct."
 
That sound you hear is the world's smallest violin, playing for "commentator Guillermo Gomez Pena." According to  National Public Radio  http://www.npr.org/programs/atc/commentaries/2001/dec/ , he "had a series of nasty incidents at airports since Sept. 11. Besides looking Arab, his intense look as a performance artist makes him a candidate for profiling."

The  Washington Post  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9569-2001Dec20.html  reports from Kandahar on Taliban hypocrisy and brutality. The dispatch begins with an amusing account from a mechanic, who was fixing a Talib big shot's Toyota pickup truck when he came upon "three tapes, by pop singers Nagham, Raub and Habib Sharif." The Taliban, of course, forbade music. More chillingly, residents of Kandahar had to lie to protect their own safety:

*** QUOTE ***

Zahir Jan, a Kandahar resident hanging around the headquarters of an anti-Taliban warlord today, still wore the black turban of the identity he sloughed off just a fortnight ago.

"I used to say, 'Yeah, I'm Taliban,' but the problem was I was scared," said Jan, when asked to explain the apparent ease of his transformation.

"Everybody was the same--scared. If you don't say you're Taliban, they would take me to the north," Jan said, referring to the Taliban's war against the opposition Northern Alliance. "You'll be on the front line. If you say you're Taliban, you stay in Kandahar with the family."

*** END QUOTE ***

Meanwhile, the  Torrance (Calif.) Daily Breeze  http://www.dailybreeze.com/content/bln/nmsburkha20.html  reports that five protesters showed up to a meeting of the Rancho Palos Verdes City Council clad in burkhas, to protest the council's Taliban-like behavior. So, is music against the law in this tony L.A. suburb? Are dissenters being rousted from their homes and sent into battle?

Well, no, not quite. The protesters were peeved because of "what they portrayed as a sexist decision not to elect the panel's only woman as deputy mayor."

Euro-Weenies  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A10054-2001Dec20.html

People from other parts of the world often ask: Why is America so arrogant? One reason surely is that the rest of the world is so silly. Especially Europe. In his Washington Post column, Robert Kagan reprints an excerpt of a discussion between leaders of European Union member countries debating the burning issue of whether the EU food-safety agency should be headquartered in Finland or Italy:

*** QUOTE ***

Silvio Berlusconi (Italian prime minister): "Parma is synonymous with good cuisine. The Finns don't even know what prosciutto is. I cannot accept this."

Wolfgang Schuessel (Austrian chancellor): "I'm not satisfied. We got nothing."

Goran Persson (Swedish prime minister): "This is no easy task. . . . But it's strange that the IT [information technology] agency should go to Spain."

Guy Verhofstadt (Belgian prime minister and acting EU president): "The gastronomic attraction of a region is no argument for the allocation of an EU agency."

Jacques Chirac (French president): "How would it be if Sweden got an agency for training models, since you have such pretty women?"

Berlusconi: ". . . My final answer is no!"

Gerhard Schroeder (German chancellor): "I love Parma, but you'll never get it if you argue like that."

Verhofstadt: "That's it."

*** END QUOTE ***

Kagan adds: "With that, Verhofstadt closed the meeting, for, as he later told reporters, "further negotiating . . . would have given a very negative image of what Europe is all about."

It Really Is a Permanent Campaign  http://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/21/politics/21CLIN.html

Bill Clinton is devoting his retirement to . . . improving the image of his presidency. The New York Times (link requires registration) reports:

*** QUOTE ***

Frustrated that his image has been battered since he left office, Mr. Clinton summoned several of his aides and advisers on Wednesday to devise ways to remind the public of his accomplishments and defend his legacy against criticism on matters including his role in the current recession and his failure to strike a fatal blow against Osama bin Laden or his terrorist network after the embassy bombings in East Africa in 1998.

Several participants at the meeting in Mr. Clinton's Harlem office said in interviews that they had agreed to compile a list of the Clinton administration's achievements that his supporters could have handy when defending the president. They hope to build a staff that will coordinate efforts to enlist former cabinet secretaries and other Clinton surrogates to appear on television talk shows and deliver speeches. And they are making plans to raise Mr. Clinton's profile on the lecture circuit, particularly before college audiences, which are most receptive.

*** END QUOTE ***

Some Clintonites, at least, have a little dignity. Erstwhile national security adviser Sandy Berger tells the Times: ""I feel very uncomfortable talking about these meetings."

Rush to Hear Again  http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_122001/content/statement.guest.html

Rush Limbaugh's "cochlear implant" operation was a success. "I feel great!" Limbaugh says in a press release. "The surgery went smoothly and I'm looking forward to enjoying the holidays and returning to the air in early January." Physician Antonio De la Cruz says Limbaugh should be able to hear within a few weeks. Our  John Fund  http://opinionjournal.com/diary/?id=95001300  described Limbaugh's affliction and treatment back in October, when it became public.

Homelessness Rediscovery Watch

*** QUOTE ***

"If George W. Bush becomes president, the armies of the homeless, hundreds of thousands strong, will once again be used to illustrate the opposition's arguments about welfare, the economy, and taxation."-- Mark Helprin  http://opinionjournal.com/columnists/mhelprin/?id=65000507 , Oct. 31, 2000

"Homelessness Has New Face: Working poor fill shelters as job market sags and housing prices surge"--headline and subheadline, Raleigh (N.C.)  News & Observer  http://www.newsobserver.com/friday/news/triangle/Story/846817p-832220c.html , Dec. 21, 2001

*** END QUOTE ***

Meanwhile,  Nick Coleman  http://www.pioneerplanet.com/news/mtc_docs/211271.htm  of the St. Paul Pioneer Press pens a sympathetic profile of a homeless pair, John Heitman and Amy Robson, who Coleman says are engaged to be married. The last paragraph begins: " 'I've got to behave out here,' Heitman says, explaining that he has cut down on his drinking, limiting himself to eight beers a day." The next time you're tempted to ignore the plight of the homeless, imagine how you'd feel if you had to survive on eight beers a day.

(Thanks to David Merrill, Jay Brinker, Raghu Desikan, T.A. Young, Robert LeChevalier, Michiel Visser, Mike Basham, C.E. Dobkin, S.E. Brenner, Jim Melcher, Bill Sullivan, Alan Toole, Mike Sierra, Marc Bielec, Jerome Marcus, Brad Broyles, Chris Ruff and Jon Schaff. If you have a tip, write us at  Review & Outlook  mailto:opinionjournal@wsj.com : The Saddam we know (link requires registration).
- Peggy Noonan  http://opinionjournal.com/columnists/pnoonan/?id=95001630 : Who should get a Medal of Freedom?
- Daniel Henninger  http://opinionjournal.com/columnists/dhenninger/?id=95001628 : Festive New York renews itself for the holidays.

And on the Taste page:
- Review & Outlook  http://opinionjournal.com/taste/?id=95001623 : Our friends the Saudis hold two Americans prisoner.
- Tony & Tacky  http://opinionjournal.com/taste/?id=95001624 : Rutgers snubs a war hero--again.
- William McGurn  http://opinionjournal.com/taste/?id=95001625 : Kids cry "Uncle" on Christmas, and uncles come.
- Gene Edward Vieth  http://opinionjournal.com/taste/?id=95001627 : Especially at Christmas, every family is holy.
- Jared Paul Stern  http://opinionjournal.com/taste/?id=95001626 : Save me from panicked country-house hunters.
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