Ordinarily, the Arab states in the region are quick to condemn any warlike act by Israel, even measures as defensive as building a barrier against terrorists. Although many Arab states are unhappy these days with Syria’s budding alliance with Iran, Israel is still, to one degree or another, the enemy, and Syria is, at worst, a wayward brother. So why were the Arab states suddenly mum about this invasion of Syria’s sovereignty?
Their reticence — and that of the rest of the international community, including the United States and Western Europe — suggests, I think, that even though most governments believed that this was indeed a blow against Syrian nuclear ambitions, none of them, frankly, were displeased to see it happen. The fact is that virtually every government in the world, regardless of its feelings about Israel, recognizes that a Syrian nuclear weapons program would make the Middle East and the world more dangerous. True, Israel already has such weapons, to the dismay of many others, especially its neighbors. But few see a Syrian nuclear arsenal as an antidote.
“Faggot!” cried Humpty-Dumpty, gleenfully.
Fisk reminds us why he’s famous:
After writing about the “ravers” who regularly turn up at lectures to claim that President Bush/the CIA/the Pentagon/Mossad etc perpetrated the crimes against humanity of 11 September, I received a letter this week from Marion Irvine, who feared that members of her family run the risk of being just such “ravers” and “voices heard in the wilderness”. Far from it.
For Mrs Irvine was writing about Lockerbie, and, like her, I believe there are many dark and sinister corners to this atrocity. I’m not at all certain that the CIA did not have a scam drugs heist on board and I am not at all sure that the diminutive Libyan agent Megrahi – ultimately convicted on the evidence of the memory of a Maltese tailor – really arranged to plant the bomb on board Pan Am Flight 103 in December 1988.
Ready for Coast-to-Coast late night radio, I think.
Comment by Mikey NTH on 10/14 @ 12:11 pm #
The LA Times has just displayed what my dad would call “a masterful grasp of the obvious”. Few in a neighborhood would be terribly upset if the local trouble-maker has a severe weed-whacker accident and is laid up for a couple of weeks. Much like the elementary school students breathe prayers of thanks when the class bully gets his clock cleaned.
They may not vocally support the errant weed-whacker or the bully-thrasher, but they aren’t terribly upset about either incident happening.
Comment by andy on 10/14 @ 12:15 pm #
Makes sense. Before Israel bombed Iraq’s Osirak reactor, Iran had tried and failed. NUANCE.
Comment by happyfeet on 10/14 @ 12:18 pm #
You have to wonder but that China was not somewhat sensitive about the implication of North Korea, and may have told the Saudis and friends to keep their stupid mouths shut.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 10/14 @ 12:28 pm #
I am not at all certain that Master Fisk is not having a psychotic break.
Comment by McGehee on 10/14 @ 12:42 pm #
In his case, wouldn’t that mean taking a break from psychosis?
Comment by happyfeet on 10/14 @ 1:46 pm #
Lessee – the strike on Syria was September 6. A month later, we have this. It just seems that the Chinese have more to lose with respect to disclosure of North Korean proliferation than Saudi Arabia has to gain by pitching a fit about Syrian sovereignty or whatever.
China’s little proxy state just tried to hook up Iran’s little friend with a nuclear program. I don’t see how that can’t be a factor in Saudi-Sino relations is all. I say “Saudi-Sino” cause that makes it sound like I have any idea what I’m talking about.
Comment by Dan Collins on 10/14 @ 1:51 pm #
Well, yeah. Then there’s the proximity to Israel via Southern Lebanon. Who needs sophisticated missiles to deliver such a thing?
Comment by Slartibartfast on 10/14 @ 2:01 pm #
15-minute break, McGeehee; union rules. Whether he thinks he needs it or not.
Comment by Brett on 10/14 @ 2:29 pm #
And people who say things like this have the temerity to call me naive. Humbug!
Comment by mac on 10/14 @ 2:52 pm #
Hey, what’s with the poke at coast-to-coast?
Comment by Jeffersonian on 10/14 @ 3:27 pm #
I agree, #10. Art Bell was many things, but he was always fun and always entertaining. Fisk is more along the lines of that corrosive cretin Jeff Rense.
Comment by guinsPen on 10/14 @ 3:57 pm #
I’m not at all certain that RF is not a manbearpigporker.
Comment by Big Bang (Pumping you up) on 10/14 @ 4:45 pm #
- As for the Saudi’s, don’t think China had to sit too hard on them. Neither Syria, nor the Iranian Theofscists are on the Saudi’s christmas list. Think proximity.
Comment by Spiny Norman on 10/14 @ 4:50 pm #
#10 mac
Hey, what’s with the poke at coast-to-coast?
I don’t believe it was so much a poke at Art or George, but at the wacky callers.
Am I right, Dan?
Comment by narciso on 10/14 @ 5:29 pm #
This theory really surfaced from an
‘alleged’ former Mossad agent named
Juval Aviv; who really was nothing more
than a customs inspector, yet was the main source for George Jonas’sVengeance which was in turn the source for Steven Spielberg’s Munich. His report for an insurance company that had the policy became involved in a lawsuit just slightly less byzantine than the Christic Institute. It makes much of
one of earlier stops of the CIA team, that included Matt Gannon and Daniel Lariviere; was in Beirut, where they
were searching for hostages, when they
became entangled with a PFLP-GC cell;
(coincidentally a splinter of the group
that had kidnapped and murdered the American ambassador and his driver, 13
years before) headed by Ahmed Jibril. The cell leader. Dalkamouni was not only
of that group; but according to Bob Baer, Muslim Brotherhood. It is curious
how the trail led to Syria until after
the start of Desert shield. Curiously,
though, Fisk has been a guest in Beirut
under Syrian/Hezbollah auspices
Comment by Dan Collins on 10/15 @ 2:57 am #
Maybe I just don’t know Art Bell well enough. But I was actually thinking of as a guest.
Comment by Mikey NTH on 10/15 @ 5:56 am #
“Curiously,
though, Fisk has been a guest in Beirut
under Syrian/Hezbollah auspices”
Not so curious at all – he has been one of their most enthusiastic propaganda outlets – and he’ll do that for a nice hotel room and a good meal.
Comment by maor on 10/16 @ 4:02 am #
Arab countries haven’t protested much because Syria claims that Israel didn’t actually bomb anything, and even if, hypothetically, Israel did try to bomb something in Syria, it certainly would not have been a nuclear plant, and whatever it would have been, the Syrians would have prevented Israel from bombing it anyway.
Hard to get all that angry under those circumstances.