Daniel in Brookline

Quillnews urges all to take a closer look at the realities that are obscured by the fancy in these snap shots of simple human courtesy. The US, acting virtually on its own initiative with only its closest blood brothers-in-arms as allies, responded to a single attack – Sept 11 – and destroyed the governments of Afghanistan, Iraq and changed the on-the-ground behavior of Pakistan, India, Syria, Lebanon, Libya. Bush 43 did this with a working majority of the American electorate, and all the while under relentless attack by his political opponents who, despite all efforts for two years, were unable to shake the American people’s support of the war. Abdullah knows his society has spawned a murderous enemy and ideology that has been growing for years and nurtured by his people and their clerics. Imagine what the American people would do to Abdullah's kingdom if the homeland of the US or its allies were hit a second time!!!

The Saudi’s are masters as duplicity, but check out Bush 43. Sure the guy can be polite and solitious. So what? Bush 43 is at the top of his game; this is a guy who defended his country, redeemed his father and who is with a will, with a faith, with the weapons and the license to get done what he knows the people want. Any many of his countrymen are just beginning to connect the dots about religious freedom. (China take note!) A Yale Bonesman will always show courtesy. That’s basic. Of course Bush 43 would be kind and courtly in public to the elderly man visiting his home who is seeking reassurance that he is moving in the right direction. More important is whether the guest is “on the team.”

Martin Luther King Jr. once said of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the martyred World War II pastor, “if your opponent has a conscience, then follow Gandhi. But if you enemy has no conscience, like Hitler, then follow Bonhoeffer.”

Is [your] opponent President Bush, or Saddam Hussein?

A Russian immigrant turned Israeli policeman has won the Jewish state's second-highest military honor.

Known only by his initial, Y., the commander of the Border Police undercover unit called Yasam was awarded the Medal for Courage on Tuesday for a string of deadly counterterrorist missions in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Yasam is the Hebrew acronym for Police Reconnaissance Unit.

"I just did my job as best I knew how," Y., a 30-year-old father of two, told Ma'ariv before the awards ceremony. "I wasn't expecting a decoration." Yasam usually seeks out recruits among Sephardi Jews who can pass for Palestinians and handle the rough world of covert operations.

It might seem an odd home for Y., the piano-playing son of Muscovite academics who immigrated to Israel when he was 16. But he now has two dozen confirmed "kills" of terrorist fugitives to his name.

Y. described Yasam as his Zionist calling. "Even in the worst of times, we always knew Israel was the place for us," he said. "The same went for the military. Even back in Russia, we would hear about the Israeli military. For me, it was a personal challenge to serve in it."

"The Holocaust is very deeply ingrained in me. With time, I understood how terrible it was, and understood that we, the Jews, must know how to protect ourselves without asking questions or permission."

Drafted into the Border Police, Y. performed so well that the commanders asked him to become an officer despite his faulty Hebrew. Then came the outbreak of Palestinian violence in 2000, and Y. found Arabic to be just as useful.

According to comrades, he is first to volunteer for the most dangerous missions in the grim alleyways of the refugee camps favored as hideouts by Palestinian gunmen. "There is something wrong with his fear instinct. It does not exist," one said.

Once inside Tulkarm, Y. and his comrade found their target. When he resisted arrest, they shot him dead, waking up all the other gunmen in the camp.

So Y. decided to use the commotion to their benefit, driving out at full speed and shouting "Army! Army!" in Arabic. The Palestinian locals, thinking the two undercover cops were gunmen on the run from Israeli special forces, made way, letting them escape.

Y. "was the only one who said the mission was possible," said Col. Tamir Heyman, a West Bank brigade commander. "And he made it so."

Israeli President Moshe Katsav said he shook hands with the leaders of Syria and Iran at Pope John Paul’s funeral yesterday, when the Pontiff in death brought together Middle East foes as no man alive ever had.

Katsav’s encounters with President Bashar Assad of Syria, formally at war with the Jewish state, and Iranian President Mohamed Khatami occurred when hundreds of international dignitaries crowded together at the Vatican funeral.

The encounters, are believed to be the first time an Israeli president had shaken hands with Syrian and Iranian leaders. It was unknown whether the handshakes were captured on film.

“I told him ‘Good morning’ and he shook my hand,” Katsav, who holds a largely ceremonial post as head of state, told Israel’s Channel 2 TV on his encounter with Assad. The Israeli and Syrian delegations had been seated next to each other.

Iranian-born Katsav said he spoke in his native Farsi to Khatami about Yazd, their common city of birth.

“The president of Iran extended his hand to me, I shook it and told him in Farsi, ‘May peace be upon you’,” said Katsav...

The official Syrian news agency Sana later said Katzav and Assad had shaken hands but that it had “no political significance and does not alter the known Syrian position” toward the Jewish state.

Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom later told CNN that the handshakes gave Israel a “glimmer of hope that something can change in the Middle East”, but that peace between Israel and the two countries was still far off.

“There is still a long way to go before we can reach a compromise. But sometimes things can start with one gesture,” Shalom said.

It's a shame that I'm here in Iraq with the Marines right now and not back at Ohio University completing my senior year and joining in blissful ignorance with the enlightened, war-seasoned protesters who participated in the recent "die-in" at College Gate. It would appear that all the action is back home, but why don't we make sure? That's right, this is an open invitation for you to cut your hair, take a shower, get in shape and come on over! If Michael Moore can shave and lose enough weight to fit into a pair of camouflage utilities, then he can come too!

Make sure you all say your goodbyes to your loved ones though, because you won't be seeing them for at least the next nine months. You need to get here quick because I don't want you to miss a thing. You missed last month's discovery of a basement full of suicide vests from the former regime (I'm sure Saddam's henchmen just wore them because they were trendy though). You weren't here for the opening of a brand new school we built either. You might also notice women exercising their new freedom of walking to the market unaccompanied by their husbands.

There is a man here, we just call him al-Zarqawi, but we think he'd be delighted to sit down and give you some advice on how you can further disrespect the victims of Sept. 11 and the 1,600 of America's bravest who have laid down their lives for a safer world. Of course he'll still call you "infidel" but since you already agree that there is no real evil in the world, I see no reason for you to be afraid. Besides, didn't you say that radical Islam is a religion of peace and tolerance?

I'm warning you though -it's not going to be all fun and games over here. You might have bad dreams for the next several nights after you zip up the body bag over a friend's disfigured face. I know you think that nothing, even a world free of terror for one's children, is worth dying for, but bear with me here. We're going to live in conditions you've never dreamt about. You should get here soon though, because the temperatures are going to be over 130 degrees very soon and we will be carrying full combat loads (we're still going to work though). When it's all over, I promise you can go back to your coffee houses and preach about social justice and peace while you continue to live outside of reality.

If you decide to decline my offer, then at least you should sleep well tonight knowing that men wearing black facemasks and carrying AK-47s yelling "Allahu Akbar" over here are proud of you and are forever indebted to you for advancing their cause of terror. While you ponder this, I'll get back to the real "die-in" over here. I don't mind.