Words matter [updated]

Scanning the news today, I was struck by a headline on Reuters stating: “Majority of Palestinians back suicide bombing”. The following is a brief excerpt from the article: Seventy-five percent of Palestinians support the suicide bombing at an Israeli restaurant two weeks ago in which 21 people, including four children, were killed, a Palestinian survey shows. “The survey by the Palestinian Centre for Policy and Survey Research, which questioned 1,318 respondents in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, also showed that 85 percent of Palestinians support a “mutual cessation of violence by both sides”. The poll found considerable anti-American feeling…

Okay, so I have stated my opposition to the war in Lebanon, but I also want to take another track. I watched with revulsion and anger as parents pulled their children from the rubble of the building hit in Qana. Later when watching the protests as a result of the bombing, it came to me that if the situation was reversed, and a Hizbollah rocket slammed into an Isreali building killing 60 people including women and children, there probably would have been rejoicing around the Arab world. Hizbollah is firing indiscriminately at cities across the border and it is only…

Never in my darkest days did I ever think that I would be agreeing soooo much with Patrick Buchanan.  The clairty of his arguement in this case is simply stunning.  He takes on the term "Islamo-facism" as used by Bush et al and digs a 6 feet grave for it (RIP).  Here are some tasty quotes: Unsurprisingly, it is neoconservatives, whose roots are in the Trotskyist-social Democratic left, who are promoting use of the term. Their goal is to have Bush stuff al-Qaida, Hamas, Hezbollah, Syria and Iran into the same “Islamo-fascist” kill box, then let Strategic Air Command do…