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Prepared for the
Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations in association with the Fairness Project by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs
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To contact the Presidents Conference: [email protected]
In-Depth Issue:
Report: Saudi Arabia Funded Pak Nuke Plan (Press Trust of India)
"Saudi Arabia has been involved in funding Pakistan's missile and nuclear program purchases from China, which has resulted in Pakistan becoming a nuclear weapon-producing and proliferating state," says Thomas Woodrow, a former senior China analyst for the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA).
Fears of Terrorist Attacks Hit Peak - Michael Evans, Rosemary Bennett and Roger Boyes (London Times)
Intelligence intercepts of al Qaeda suspects have uncovered a level of terrorist plotting on the same scale as in the weeks leading up to the September 11 attacks.
Russia Adds Range to Iran's Missiles - Philip Sherwell
(Telegraph - UK)
Iran has been supplied by Russia with powerful new technology and parts for long-range missiles that will put Israel and the whole of the Middle East - including British and U.S. forces in the region - within its 1,300 mile reach.
Tokyo Minister Apologizes for Anti-Semitic Remark (Straits Times - Singapore
Japan's Vice-Minister for Health has apologized to the Israeli ambassador and retracted a comment he made this week that was criticized as anti-Semitic.
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News Resources - North America and Europe:
A mother and her two children, ages 4 and 5, were murdered in their beds near midnight Sunday by a Palestinian terrorist who attacked Kibbutz Metzer, north of Hadera. A man and a woman were also shot dead. The Al-Aksa Martyr Brigades, the military wing of PA Chairman Yasser Arafat's Fatah terror organization, claimed responsibility for the attack. (Washington Post/Jerusalem Post) Three people were killed and scores injured in the southern Jordanian city of Maan after heavy gunfire broke out between hundreds of masked armed youths and police as security forces sought Muslim militants linked to the killing of a U.S. diplomat two weeks ago. (Reuters) According to the Jordanian minister of information, Mohammed Adwan, the wanted men had been protected by others carrying sub-machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades. Tribal leaders in Maan, a deeply conservative Sunni Muslim city, had refused to surrender the wanted men. (Independent - UK) The Egyptian TV series, "Horseman Without a Horse," inspired in part by "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion," a century-old anti-Semitic tract, has provoked an international confrontation, with the U.S. and Israel accusing Egypt of complicity in anti-Semitism. This week members of Congress led by Sens. Carl Levin and John Warner of the Armed Services Committee wrote to President Hosni Mubarak and urged him to take the series off the air. (Washington Post) See also Anti-Semitic Show Offers Glimpse of Egypt's Views "The sons of Zion took Palestine through organized deceit and plundering,'' a narrator intoned as he introduced the first episode on state-owned television. "All of Egypt hates the Jews,'' declares Ahmed Helmy, an otherwise mild-mannered high school math teacher after watching the second episode Friday. "They are our No. 1 enemy.'' (San Jose Mercury News) Syria joined a 15-0 vote in the UN Security Council on Friday in favor of a resolution demanding that Iraq accept unconditional arms inspections. Arab League members "told Syria that it should support sending a strong message to Iraq that it must implement Security Council resolutions,'' said Ambassador Peter Kolby of Norway. Syria would not have voted in favor of the resolution without Saudi urging, said Patrick Clawson, deputy director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. (Bloomberg) Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose party won the recent Turkish elections, said in an interview: "The relationship with Israel will continue. The statements [I have] made concerning Palestine are because of the situation there. We do not want to see any more blood, tears or war. We want a permanent peaceful solution to the problem, with the two states respecting each other's rights. We're against all types of terrorism - from individual to state terrorism. We are by no means anti-Semitic. It hurts us as much when Palestinians are bombed and killed as when a suicide bomber goes and kills Jews. Indeed, we condemn all incidents of terrorism in the world, including September 11th." (Washington Post)
News Resources - Israel and Mideast:
Just hours before the attack on Kibbutz Metzer, border policemen near the kibbutz stopped a Palestinian car carrying two suspected terrorists on Sunday. The car then exploded, killing its two occupants. The IDF ended its 16-day operation in Jenin after the killing Saturday of the head of Islamic Jihad in the area, Iyad Sawalha. The Jenin operation saw the arrest of three would-be suicide bombers and 40 other wanted men, and uncovered 12 apartments used as weapons caches and three bomb-making laboratories. The homes of 12 senior terrorists and suicide bombers were destroyed. (Ha'aretz) See also Iyad Sawalha - Story of a Killer - Khaled Abu Toameh Sawalha was responsible for the deaths of 31 Israelis. At 19 he killed a headman of a nearby village on suspicion of collaboration with Israel. "I knocked on the door and when he opened it, I strangled him to death with my own hands," he said with a smile. "He was about 70 years old and it wasn't a problem to kill him." (Jerusalem Post) Staff Sergeant Medin Grifat 23, a Bedouin from of Beit Zarzir, was killed last Saturday by an explosive device in the Gaza Strip. "Medin Grifat was an extremely sharp young man, observant, self-disciplined; all the characteristics that make a successful tracker. In the past, he identified and discovered at least 3 explosive devices," said Trackers Brigade commander Colonel Pini Ganon. (IDF)
Global Commentary and Think-Tank Analysis
(Best of U.S., UK, and Israel):
The reason Arafat is still in power is that the old guard he has appointed to positions in his cabinet are making a killing from those posts. They have managed to squirrel away millions from the funding given to the PA throughout the last several years. The PA was corrupt before it ever became a government. The PLO was corrupt in Amman, Beirut, and Tunis. All of the various Palestinian groups presumably fighting for the liberation of Palestine were profit-making enterprises. Abu Bakr, the number two man in the Abu Nidal Group, told me that Abu Nidal had a portfolio of millions earned through extortion and bribes, invested in the United States. (UPI) No serious analyst believes Saddam's threat of defending the Iraqi capital street by street. There are 1 million Kurds and Turkomans and almost 2 million Shi'ites in Baghdad, many of whom have lost family members to Saddam�s bloody campaigns of repression. The Sunni Arabs have suffered even longer under the brutal regime. Once American and British troops arrive to guarantee that Baghdad�s inhabitants will not be abandoned, the vast majority of the city's population are far more likely to turn against their oppressors than to fight troops that would free them from tyranny. (London Times) I had been wanting to catch a glimpse of the mutawwa, the bully boys from the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice who go around harassing and arresting Saudis in the name of Islam. My dinner companion, Adel al-Jubeir, was a smooth Georgetown-educated spokesman for the Saudis who has been the kingdom's point man on the Sunday talk shows. Suddenly, four men bore down on us. They pointed to my neck and hips, and the embarrassed diplomat explained that I had been busted by the vice squad. Apparently, the mutawwa are not on board with the Saudis' multimillion-dollar charm offensive to persuade America that the kingdom is not a hotbed of hostile religious zealots. (New York Times) War Plan in Iraq Sees Large Force and Quick Strikes - David E. Sanger, Eric Schmitt, and Thom Shanker (New York Times)
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