"it's Open Season On Arabs.....

[BinZiad]

Subject: "IT'S OPEN SEASON ON ARABS"


Attorney General John Ashcroft recently met with

President Bush to share details of his latest

anti-terrorism measures, designed to prevent attacks

on America while preserving freedom and human rights

for all law-abiding citizens and visitors who don't

look Arabic.



ASHCROFT: "Mr. President, you'll be glad to know that

the FBI database has been improved. It now holds a

comprehensive list of groups and individuals that have

given us trouble of any sort, including Al Qaeda, Al

Jihad and Al Gore."



BUSH: "Al Gore? He's not a terrorist, is he?"



ASHCROFT: "Probably not, Mr. President. But the FBI

tapped his phone line and heard him say he's targeting

the White House. We've been spying on him ever since

he grew that beard."



BUSH: "Good idea, John. The beard was mighty

suspicious. Make sure you let me know if you spot him

wearing a turban. That's usually the next step. It

would give us enough evidence to detain him."



ASHCROFT: "Yes, Mr. President. We're also starting a

program to fingerprint and photograph visitors from

certain countries, particularly the Islamic

countries."



BUSH: "Good idea, John. And let's not forget the

Muslim countries either."



ASHCROFT: "Yes, Mr. President. We're trying to use a

variety of methods. That's why we're reorganizing the

CIA. It will now stand for Central Investigation of

Arabs. We don't want to put all our eggs in one basket."



BUSH: "That's good, John! Remember: money is no

object. We can always buy more baskets. We'll import

them if we need to."



ASHCROFT: "Uh ... yes, sir, whatever you say. The ACLU

claims we're being discriminatory, but let's face

facts: One out of ten Arabs hates America. That

doesn't seem bad -- until you realize that only one

out of 50 hates Salman Rushdie. We need to look at the

big picture. If only one out of every 100,000 Arabs is

a terrorist, that doesn't seem like a problem. But if

we allow a million of them to enter the country, we're

admitting 10 terrorists!"



BUSH: "That's scary, John. But I have a solution:

Let's allow only 999,990 to enter."



ASHCROFT: "Yes, but how do we know which 10 to leave out?"



BUSH: "Well, we can start with Louis Farrakhan. I never did like him."



ASHCROFT: "Uh ... he's African-American, sir. Would you like us to

detain him?"



BUSH: "Yes, John, for at least a few decades. Inoticed you've detained

several other people who aren't Arabs."



ASHCROFT: "Yes, but they all have connections to the

Arab world. For example, we've detained a man named

Levi Bara. If you take the first letters of his names and move them to

the end, what do you get? Evil Arab. Just a coincidence? I don't
think

so.

We've also detained a woman named Greta Baily. If you rearrange

the letters of her names, what do you get? Great Libya."



BUSH: "That's scary. But isn't it hard to keep track of all these
names?"


ASHCROFT: "Well, we're analyzing names using computer

software created by an Indian programmer named Prash

Desai. We hired him because his name -- you'll be glad to know -- can
be

rearranged to form Sharp Ideas."



BUSH: "Wonderful! It's a good thing we grabbed him before India did.

Remind me to tell the Pakistani president, Perverse Mushroom, that

we did him a big favor."

[Lulua]

Bush is intent on painting allies and enemies in the Middle East as evil
By Robert Fisk
10 September 2002
Internal links


The crucial question remains: is the Iraqi President mad as well as bad?
Just as Americans are recovering from the harrowing television re-runs of the 11 September attacks, their President is going to launch the biggest reshaping of the Middle East since the British and French parcelled out the Arab lands after the 1914-18 war. When he addresses the United Nations on Thursday, George Bush will be threatening not only Iraq – which had absolutely nothing to do with the crimes against humanity in New York and Washington – but Syria, Iran and, by extension, Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

The Syrian Accountability Act, which accuses Damascus of supporting "terrorism", will come into force as President Bush is speaking and will follow only days after the State Department branded the Lebanese Hizbollah as the "A-team of terrorism", more dangerous even than Osama bin Laden's al-Qa'ida. Like Iraq, the Hizbollah had nothing to do with the 11 September attacks – indeed, they were among the first to condemn them – but the White House now seems set on painting allies and enemies alike in the Middle East as a focus of evil.

Only The Nation among all of America's newspapers and magazines has dared to point out that a large number of former Israeli lobbyists are now working within the American administration and the Bush plans for the Middle East – which could cause a massive political upheaval in the Arab world – fit perfectly into Israel's own dreams for the region. The magazine listed Vice-President Dick Cheney – the arch-hawk in the US administration – and John Bolton, now under-secretary of state for Arms Control, with Douglas Feith, the third most senior executive at the Pentagon, as members of the advisory board of the pro-Israeli Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (Jinsa) before joining the Bush government. Richard Perle, chairman of the Pentagon's Defence Policy Board, is still an adviser on the institute, as is the former CIA director James Woolsey.

Michael Ledeen, described by The Nation as "one of the most influential 'Jinsans' in Washington" has been calling for "total war" against "terror" – with "regime change" for Syria, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the Palestinian Authority. Mr Perle advises the Defence Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld – who refers to the West Bank and Gaza as "the so-called occupied territories" – and arranged the anti-Saudi "kernel of evil" briefing by Laurent Murawiec that so outraged the Saudi royal family last month. The Saudi regime may itself be in great danger as the princes of the House of Saud attempt to seize more power for themselves in advance of the depart-ure of the dying King Fahd.

Jinsa's website says it exists to "inform the American defence and foreign affairs community about the important role Israel can and does play in bolstering democratic interests in the Mediterranean and the Middle East". Next month, Michael Rubin of the right-wing and pro-Israeli American Enterprise Institute – who referred to the outgoing UN human rights commissioner Mary Robinson as an abettor of "terrorism" – joins the US Defence Department as an Iran-Iraq "expert".

According to The Nation, Irving Moskovitz, the California bingo magnate who has funded settlements in the Israeli-occupied territories, is a donor as well as a director of Jinsa.

President Bush, of course, will not be talking about the influence of these pro-Israeli lobbyists when he presents his vision of the Middle East at the United Nations on Thursday.

Nor will he give the slightest indication that the region is, in the words of its own kings and dictators, a powder keg of resentment and anger. The tectonic plates of the Arab world are now grinding with increasing violence. Into this political earthquake zone, Mr Bush now seems intent on leading his country, with his loyal British ally.

Most of today's Arab nations were fashioned out of the ruins of the Ottoman Empire by Britain and France in the aftermath of the First World War – and Palestinians still blame Britain today for supporting the formation of a Jewish homeland in Palestine.

Both European nations stationed tens of thousands of troops across the region, suppressing Arab revolts in Palestine, Syria and Lebanon – itself created by the French at the request of its Christian Maronite community. The whole colonial framework led to the loss of tens of thousands of lives before both the British and French retreated from the Middle East.

Now President Bush seems set on following the colonial powers into the region for another military and political adventure – ostensibly to spread "democracy" among those nations it most despises (Iraq, Palestine and Iran) but in fact more likely to increase American control of an increasingly anti-Western Arab world.

The Arabs themselves warn that this will lead to massive instability and widespread violence. The Israelis – and their allies in the US administration – are hell bent on the whole shebang.

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=332011