Did Israel Redo Osirak in Syria? One Arab and American Similarity, Killjoys of Arabia
Is it true that Syria was building a bomb? Did Israel bomb it in time?
It is a small world: how Arabs and Americans are so similar.
Saudi-BAE bribe case, killed by Tony Blair, is alive and at least smoldering.
Beauty vs. beasts: why Arab Islamists are obsessed with a Lebanese singer.
Do I hear a 'gas' tax moratorium? No shortage of Rice here
A mysterious bombing:
The plot thickens in the Syrian nuclear program story.
The recent claims that Syria was building a nuclear rector with North Korean help may explain why North Korea was one of a handful countries, like three, to condemn the Israeli bombing deep inside Syria several months ago. Now a Japanese network claims that ten North Koreans were killed during that bombing.
According to some 'official' Arab sources, not very friendly to Syria these days, Israel may have done a new Osirak operation- a repeat of the bombing of Iraq's nuclear reactor in 1981. This time against the other branch of the Ba'ath party.
Many in the Arab world, including many journalists and opinionators, doubt the veracity of US and Israeli claims about a Syrian project. I expressed my own strong doubts here many weeks ago right after the mysterious bombing, noting that Syria:
a) does not have the money for it and Kim Jung Il does not usually povide financing.
b) may not be stupid enough to start a nuclear program in Israel's backyard and under the curious nose of the US Sixth Fleet.
c) like all Arab regimes, cares more about surviving in power than about anything else under the sun.
So, I am still skeptic about the whole thing, although I can be wrong this time.
A global village:
Alarabiya TV shows that people are really the same: its website notes that one item yesterday was the top on its site. The same news item recorded:
The most read
The most commented on
The most printed
The most saved
The most emailed
That news item was about the Austrian man who kept his own daughter as a sex captive and sired seven children by her. The item beat everything else, including Iraq, terrorism, Palestine, purported Syrian nukes, Iranian nukes, among others. It would probably have beat the arrival of the Day of Judgment as a news item of importance. Reverend Jeremiah Wright is barely visible on the Middle East radar.
Apparently the Arab TV viewer is no different from the average American viewer. They both want their doze of television sex and scandal gossip every evening during or just after supper. In the US it is usually things like polygamist-teen marriage in Texas, child-molesting teachers in Florida, or serial wife-killer cops in the Midwest. That explains the quick shift in cable network news right about dinner time, away from important and unimportant national and international news and toward scandal mongering.
In Arabia, local crimes are not covered extensively on state TV, especially if they involve sex. But foreign sex crimes are fair game.
A bribery case revisited:
Aafaq reports that the British High Court has decided to proceed and look into the bribery case of the arms manufacrurer BAE to members of the Saudi royal family. The British government under Tony Blair had quashed an earlier investigation by the SFO, but the court has acted now by allowing the SFO to appeal an earlier jufgement that it acted illegally by stopping the investigation too soon.
A beauty and the beasts:
A pretty Lebanese singer is taking more of the time of "legislators" in the Arab world these days than any other problem. Haifa Wahbi has been scheduled to sing in Bahrain and Algeria. The Bahrain parliament (half- elected) passed an 'urgent' measure asking the government to cancel an imminent concert by the Lebanese singer. In Algeria, some Islamist killjoys in the sort-of-elected parliament has declared that she will sing in their country over their dead bodies. Perhaps they were thinking of her live body when they so opined.
Cheers
mhg
m.h.ghuloum@gmail.com
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