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Homeland Security Focus Areas
Social and Cultural Issues
July 20, 2003
F.B.I. Is Accused of Bias by Arab-American Agent
By DAVID JOHNSTON
WASHINGTON, July 19 - The F.B.I.'s highest-ranking Arab-American agent
has filed a racial discrimination lawsuit against the bureau, charging
that he was kept out of the investigation of the Sept. 11, 2001, hijackings
because of his ancestry.
The agent, Bassem Youssef, filed the lawsuit on Friday in Federal District
Court for the District of Columbia. Mr. Youssef, a naturalized American
citizen born in Egypt, said in his complaint that "no other non-Arab
F.B.I. employee with similar background and experience was willfully blocked
from working 9/11-related matters."
Some of the actions against him had broader implications, Mr. Youssef
said in his complaint, undermining important counterterrorism investigations
prior to the attacks. "The F.B.I. permitted racism to interfere with
national security," Mr. Youssef said in an earlier filing with the
Federal Bureau of Investigation's equal opportunity office.
In one incident two months before the hijackings, F.B.I. agents in Miami
lost a prospective informant on the Qaeda terrorist network because of
what Mr. Youssef said was an internal argument about his involvement in
interviews with the source. Whatever information might have been learned
was lost, he said.
Stephen M. Kohn, Mr. Youssef's lawyer, who has represented F.B.I. whistle-blowers,
said Mr. Youssef had risked his career by filing the lawsuit. "Mr.
Youssef has placed his career in jeopardy in order to ensure that the
F.B.I. can properly protect the public against another terrorist attack,"
Mr. Kohn said. "F.B.I. discrimination against Middle Easterners is
not only un-American, it also undermines the war on terrorism." He
said Mr. Youssef could not discuss the case.
A spokesman for the bureau said he could not discuss the charges. "We
have received a complaint and the matter is being investigated,"
the spokesman said. "Some of the information in the complaint is
classified and therefore it may take longer to resolve."
In his complaint, Mr. Youssef said a "glass ceiling" existed
at the bureau that blocked the advancement of Arab-Americans. The charges
come at a time when the F.B.I. is trying to hire Arab-American agents,
analysts and translators to help the bureau reshape itself into a counterterrorism
agency to respond to international threats.
The bureau is also seeking more agents with experience in the Middle East
to expand its law enforcement operations in Arabic-speaking countries.
At the same time, senior F.B.I. officials have sought to portray efforts
like the thousands of interviews with Iraqis in the United States during
the Iraq war as being conducted with discretion and sensitivity.
Mr. Youssef said in his complaint that he had been held back from senior
positions even though he was the bureau's only polygraph examiner qualified
to conduct examinations in Arabic and had an intimate understanding of
Arab culture, politics and diplomacy, knowledge that was rare among F.B.I.
agents.
In the mid-1990's, he said, he had received "exceptional" performance
evaluations when he worked as the bureau's first representative, or legal
attaché, in Saudi Arabia and had been credited by Louis J. Freeh,
the former director of the F.B.I., as helping to foster a working relationship
between the bureau and the Mabahith, the secretive Saudi security service,
in the investigation of the 1996 bombings at the Khobar Towers apartments
in Dhahran that killed 19 United States servicemen.
Some agents said in private interviews that Mr. Youssef could be abrasive,
but they added that he was hard-working.
In his post in Riyadh, he said in the complaint, he helped the bureau
obtain access to six people held in the Khobar Towers case after American
officials complained that the Saudis were not cooperating. He also resolved
minor disputes, like one that arose when an F.B.I. official was found
to have brought liquor into Saudi Arabia, an Islamic country that forbids
alcohol.
But when Mr. Youssef returned to F.B.I. headquarters in 2000, according
to his complaint, he was excluded from work on counterterrorism investigations,
which after the 9/11 attacks became highly sought-after assignments that
often led to promotions to the senior executive ranks.
Mr. Youssef is currently assigned at F.B.I. headquarters as the supervisor
of a unit that has been translating hundreds of thousands of documents
seized from Osama bin Laden's training camps and elsewhere in Afghanistan
- a job that Mr. Youssef said undervalued his knowledge and experience
as a Middle East counterterrorism expert.
At one point, he was assigned to work alongside employees who had once
reported to his subordinates. In his complaint, he said that the F.B.I.
had never promoted an American citizen born in an Arabic country in the
Middle East to a senior position. At times, he said, agents referred to
Arabs using racial slurs.
Mr. Youssef's complaints have circulated in the F.B.I. for many months.
Robert S. Mueller III, the bureau's director, was first told of them in
June 2002 when he met privately with Mr. Youssef at the office of Representative
Frank R. Wolf, Republican of Virginia. After the meeting, Mr. Mueller
said he would assign subordinates to review the case.
Mr. Mueller is scheduled to testify on Wednesday to the Senate Judiciary
Committee, and Mr. Youssef's complaints are likely to be addressed. Last
week, Justice Department officials blocked a request to interview Mr.
Youssef made by two senior members of the committee, Charles E. Grassley,
Republican of Iowa, and Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont.
Asked about the case, Mr. Grassley said: "The F.B.I. can't afford
to have discrimination within its ranks against Arab-Americans or anyone
else. It's not only wrong, but it hurts the war on terror. If these allegations
are true, the F.B.I. has a major problem that must be addressed immediately."
Mr. Leahy said: "We need to make the F.B.I. as effective and as agile
and as responsive as it can be, especially for the war on terrorism. We
have found that whistle-blowers have been among the most potent catalysts
for reform. Mr. Youssef in particular has special skills and a unique
background, and we need to know what he has to say."
Among Mr. Youssef's charges is that the bureau's bias against him undercut
terrorism investigations. In July 2001, he said in his complaint, an agent
in the bureau's Miami office telephoned Mr. Youssef for help interviewing
an unidentified Arabic-speaking "walk-in," who approached the
bureau with what Mr. Youssef said was "significant information"
about Mr. bin Laden.
Mr. Youssef said his fluency in Arabic and experience in terrorism qualified
him uniquely to conduct the interview. But, he said, when agents in the
bin Laden unit at F.B.I. headquarters learned that he was to be involved,
they intervened to exclude him.
Mr. Youssef said that without anyone qualified to conduct the interview
in Arabic, "the walk-in stopped cooperating with the F.B.I. and walked
out of the field office. Whatever information this walk-in had was lost."
Post-Sept. 11 Study Finds Increase in Bias Complaints by Muslims
in U.S.
By Caryle Murphy
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, July 16, 2003; Page A03
Muslims living in the United States were the target of more than 600
alleged incidents of discrimination, harassment and violence in 2002,
a 15 percent increase over the previous year, according to a report released
yesterday by a Washington-based Islamic advocacy organization.
The annual report by the Council on American-Islamic Relations is based
on complaints from Muslims who call the council.
Of the 602 incidents that the council recorded in 2002, 42 -- or 7 percent
-- involved violence against people or property. The most common types
of anti-Muslim incidents were alleged employment discrimination (17 percent)
and verbal harassment (15 percent), followed by failure to accommodate
religious practices (13 percent), passenger profiling in airports (12
percent) and discriminatory action by government agents, including "unreasonable
arrest, detention, surveillance [and] search" (12 percent), the report
said.
"The fallout from September 11 continues to impact Muslim daily life,
whether at schools, in the workplace or in general public encounters,"
the report said. "Mistreatment at the hand of federal government
personnel," it added, "continues to be reported in substantial
numbers."
The report, however, noted improvements in the area of airline passenger
profiling, which dropped to 12 percent of all incidents from the previous
year's 24 percent, and in "unreasonable detention, search and interrogation"
by law enforcement authorities, which fell to 12 percent from 19 percent.
The council's executive director, Nihad Awad, said at a news conference
that members of the Muslim community feel "that they have been let
down by this administration" because President Bush, during the 2000
presidential campaign, had criticized civil rights abuses against Muslims,
particularly passenger profiling at airports and the use of secret evidence
in courts.
"The government should look at the Muslim community as an ally in
the war on terrorism and not blacklist it," Awad said.
"Guilt by Association," the council's eighth annual report on
Muslim civil rights, covers January through December 2002. The council's
2002 report, which covered mid-March 2001.
CQ HOMELAND SECURITY - DEFENSE
July 2, 2003 - 6:58 p.m.
Muslim Military Chaplains Eyed by Homeland Security
by Amy Menefee, Special to CQ Homeland Security
Two organizations being investigated by the Homeland Security Department
for links to terrorist organizations are certifying Muslim chaplains to
serve in the U.S. armed forces.
The Graduate School of Islamic and Social Sciences in Leesburg, Va., and
the Islamic Society of North America, based in Plainfield, Ind., are both
associated with the militant Wahabi sect of Sunni Islam.
Wahabism, born in Saudi Arabia, is the chosen faith of Osama bin Laden
and many of his Arab followers in the al Qaeda terror organization.
The Graduate School of Islamic and Social Sciences is still under investigation
in connection with the 2002 Customs search for terrorist funding ties,
dubbed Operation Green Quest.
The Islamic Society of North America ISNA, which is affiliated with Hartford
(Conn.) Seminary's training program for Muslim chaplains, is also considered
Wahabi friendly.
Both have chaplain training degrees for Muslims. Both schools also have
a relationship with the Islamic Society of North America, which acts as
the endorsing organization for the chaplains.
Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Az., has pledged to hold hearings in his Subcommittee
on Terrorism, Technology and Homeland Security on the influence of radical
Wahabi Muslim chaplains in the military and the federal prison system.
A Defense Department spokesman said Tuesday there are no policy reviews
or investigations under way regarding chaplain selection procedures.
In addition, he said, Defense does "not discuss sects of religion."
The Washington Post reported Sunday that all 12 of the military's Muslim
chaplains are members of the Sunni tradition.
The extremist and anti-American Wahabi sect, which has been tied to the
chaplain-certifying organizations, is a Saudi Arabian offshoot of the
Sunni tradition.
The Pentagon would not release the locations of its Muslim chaplains -
seven in the Army, three in the Navy and two in the Air Force.
The chaplains serve an estimated 4,000 servicemen and women who have reported
Islam as their religion, according to 2001 Defense Department survey.
But since choosing a religious affiliation is voluntary, there is no way
to know exactly how many Muslims are in the U.S. military today.
The Chosen
Military chaplains, like federal prison chaplains, must gain the endorsement
of a religious organization from their faith as part of their application
to enter the armed forces. They also must have an approved masters degree.
The same Wahabi-connected organizations endorsing chaplains in the military
also dominate Islamic prison ministries, a congressional panel heard last
week.
But according to the Pentagon spokesman, "few programs exist in the
United States in Islamic studies that are accredited or have qualifying
institutional standing."
Only two programs provide this specialized training, and they have been
tied to Wahabi backers.
Non-Wahabi Muslim groups in the United States are calling for an equal
chance at chaplaincy spots, but they currently lack the credentials to
supply chaplains.
The Universal Muslim Association of America (UMAA), a national association
of Shiite Muslims, has between 20 and 25 chaplain candidates that are
"ready to be unleashed," said UMAA spokesman Agha Jafri.
However, those candidates may not meet the Pentagon's educational requirements.
The organization, which registered about 750 people for its first convention
in May, is ready to do whatever is necessary to break what is considered
a Wahabi headlock on the chaplaincies, Jafri said.
"We were not aware of the process" of getting chaplains endorsed,
Jafri said. "But we are going to start the process. We will do this."
Applications can be obtained through the Armed Forces Chaplains' Board
in the Pentagon.
U.S. Muslims Lobbying for Civil Rights
Jun. 8, 2003
By RACHEL ZOLL
AP Religion Writer
ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) - Before the Sept. 11 terror attacks, Islamic immigrants
generally felt so safe in the United States that they focused much of
their political activism on helping Muslims back home.
A meeting this weekend of the spiritual leaders of U.S. mosques indicates
an abrupt shift. With some of their civil rights restricted by the war
on terror, they're now lobbying to protect themselves.
"There is fatigue among some Muslims about these foreign issues.
They realize the American Muslim community can be victims, too,"
said Muqtedar Khan, a political scientist at Adrian College in Michigan
and author of "American Muslims: Bridging Faith and Freedom."
"The American government itself has become a threat to our civil
rights."
Khan was a speaker at the conference, which aimed to enlist mosque leaders,
called imams, in the fight to roll back some of the broad new enforcement
powers that authorities are using in the domestic hunt for terrorists.
Speakers decried the government's shutdown of some Muslim charities in
the United States, lengthy detention of terrorism suspects and immigrants
and the surveillance of mosques.
The event was organized by the Washington-based American Muslim Council,
among several Islamic advocacy groups searching for candidates in the
2004 elections who will give importance to Muslim civil rights problems
in their campaigns.
Of the dozen panel discussions at the meeting, only one dealt with an
international issue: Iraq. Israel and the Palestinians were mentioned
only fleetingly, while complaints about Attorney General John Ashcroft
were plentiful in the speeches and comments from participants.
This new priority is not just a sign of anger at the government's domestic
reaction to Sept. 11, 2001, Muslim leaders say. It also indicates that
many Muslims are letting go the idea that they will someday return to
their native countries.
"The vast majority of people have decided to settle here. That is
a major change," said Souheil Ghannouchi, president of the Muslim
American Society, a Washington-area organization.
Raeed Tayeh, public affairs director for the Muslim American Society,
gave a basic civics lesson on the Constitution and American government
to about 60 mosque leaders at the conference, several of whom are from
other countries.
In their speeches at prayers on Friday, the Muslim Sabbath, some foreign-born
imams who preside in American mosques often speak of injustices overseas
than in their own communities. Tayeh told them that as they begin to deal
with injustices in the United States, learning how to navigate the American
political system is "a matter of survival" for U.S Muslims.
"When you say John Ashcroft is violating our civil rights, you have
to be able to say what rights are being violated," Tayeh said.
Syed Salahuddin Hashmi, founder of Masjid Al-Arqam, a mosque in the New
York borough of Brooklyn, similarly urges his community to follow U.S.
current events.
Hashmi, who came to the United States from Pakistan in 1970, said he has
voted in every election since he became eligible to vote in 1975. The
members of his predominantly Pakistani mosque, however, "basically
talk about politics back home."
"We are trying to educate them and trying to tell them to act like
an American and take part in the building of this country," Hashmi
said.
It is a change that U.S.-born blacks, who comprise about one-third of
Muslims in America, have been eagerly awaiting. (Estimates of the number
of U.S. Muslims varies dramatically between 2 million and 6 million.)
For years, black Muslims accused immigrant Islamic leaders of ignoring
pressing domestic issues involving black Americans.
"9-11 kind of closed the gap a little bit," said Shamsud-Din
Ali, an American-born black and imam of Philadelphia Masjid. "They're
making a broader initiative. I think they have awakened to some things
and will accomplish some good."
May 29, 2003
Poverty Doesn't Create Terrorists
By ALAN B. KRUEGER
The passing of Saddam Hussein's regime will deprive terrorist networks
of a wealthy patron that pays for terrorist training, and offers rewards
to families of suicide bombers," President Bush predicted in a speech
to the American Enterprise Institute in February.
Others in the administration, including Secretary of State Colin L. Powell,
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and his deputy, Paul D. Wolfowitz,
highlighted that Iraq's widely reported increase in payments to families
of Palestinian suicide bombers, to $25,000 from $10,000, in the spring
of 2002, encouraged suicide bomb attacks. Regime change, it was argued,
would eliminate the incentive for suicide bombings.
This month's spate of suicide bombing attacks in the Middle East - five
in Israel, three in Saudi Arabia and five in Morocco - should put this
argument to rest. The number of suicide attacks per week in Israel was
higher in the month after the fall of Baghdad than it was, on average,
in the 14 months before the invasion. Of course, this is not a controlled
experiment; other contributing factors have changed. But it would seem
that the financial incentive provided by Iraq's payments has had little
impact on the supply of suicide bombers so far.
Why were the policy makers wrong?
One possibility is that there are other wealthy patrons and Islamic charities,
whose cash substituted for Saddam Hussein's.
But I suspect the main reason is that most terrorists are not motivated
by the prospect of financial gain or the hopelessness of poverty.
The stereotype that terrorists are driven to extremes by economic deprivation
may never have held anywhere, least of all in the Middle East. New research
by Claude Berrebi, a graduate student at Princeton, has found that 13
percent of Palestinian suicide bombers are from impoverished families,
while about a third of the Palestinian population is in poverty. A remarkable
57 percent of suicide bombers have some education beyond high school,
compared with just 15 percent of the population of comparable age.
This evidence corroborates findings for other Middle Eastern and Latin
American terrorist groups. There should be little doubt that terrorists
are drawn from society's elites, not the dispossessed.
Yet some stereotypes die hard. In 1958 the political scientist Daniel
Lerner argued, "The data obviate the conventional assumption that
the extremists are simply the `have-nots.' "
It is still possible that well-off people in poor countries with oppressive
governments are drawn to terrorism. President Bush argued something along
these lines in an Op-Ed article in The New York Times on the anniversary
of Sept. 11. "Poverty does not transform poor people into terrorists
and murderers," he acknowledged. "Yet poverty, corruption and
repression are a toxic combination in many societies, leading to weak
governments that are unable to enforce order or patrol their borders and
are vulnerable to terrorist networks."
To investigate this possibility, I have analyzed data the State Department
collects on significant international terrorist incidents. The home countries
of the perpetrators of each event were identified. More terrorists do
come from poor countries than rich ones, but this is because poor countries
tend to lack civil liberties.
Once a country's degree of civil liberties is taken into account - measured
by Freedom House, a nonprofit organization that promotes democracy, as
the extent to which citizens are free to develop views, institutions and
personal autonomy without interference from the state - income per capita
bears no relation to involvement in terrorism. Countries like Saudi Arabia
and Bahrain, which have spawned relatively many terrorists, are economically
well off yet lacking in civil liberties. Poor countries with a tradition
of protecting civil liberties are unlikely to spawn terrorists.
Evidently, the freedom to assemble and protest peacefully without interference
from the government goes a long way to providing an alternative to terrorism.
Apart from the size of a country and the extent of its civil liberties,
no factor that I could find - including the literacy rate, infant mortality
rate, terrain, ethnic divisions and religious fractionalization - could
predict whether people from that country were more or less likely to take
part in international terrorism.
After observing that "Saddam Hussein has raised the amount going
to suicide bombers from $10,000 to $25,000," the comedian Jay Leno
joked, "What's next, a health care plan?"
Mr. Leno may be on to something. Financial incentives usually influence
people's actions, but in this case they have a minor effect. The main
motivation is deep devotion to a political, social or religious cause.
When freedom of expression and other civil liberties are protected, there
are nonviolent ways to express this devotion.
If this is right, then terrorist attacks should increase in a repressive
regime whenever the political situation is not heading in a direction
the extremists prefer, irrespective of economic incentives. And terrorism
and hate crimes seem to be particularly prevalent when countries go through
an evolution in which normal law enforcement is disrupted, as in East
Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall.
The ultimate joke would be if civil liberties are sacrificed in the fight
against terrorism, as a lack of civil liberties seems to be a main cause
of terrorism around the world. Support for civil liberties should be part
of the arsenal in the war against terrorism, both at home and abroad.
May 17, 2003
Suicide Bombings Are Condemned in Saudi Mosques
By STEVEN R. WEISMAN
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia, May 16 - As they arrived in the torrid heat at Abu
Bakr Mosque for the first Friday Prayers since this week's bombings, most
worshipers seemed to expect that today's sermon would condemn the attacks
as contrary to Islamic tenets. They were not disappointed, or in disagreement.
"I totally reject these attacks, and I don't think anyone in Saudi
Arabia would approve them," said Khalid Ibrahim, 32, an elementary
school teacher.
But Mr. Ibrahim added that the killing of 34 Americans, Saudis and others
in the explosions at three residential compounds here in the Saudi capital
on Monday night had to be placed in context.
"I see hundreds of our Muslim brothers dying in Iraq and Palestine,"
he said. "Part of the reason for these attacks in our country is
retaliation against that injustice."
Such comments were echoed by a dozen other worshipers in an upper-class
suburb in eastern Riyadh. Many cited the Koran as teaching that the killing
of innocents, Muslim and non-Muslim alike, is not simply forbidden, but
certain to lead to punishment in hell. They cited recent headlines to
make the point of suffering by fellow Muslims.
In the holy city of Mecca, the imam of the Grand Mosque, Sheik Saleh
bin Abdullah bin Humaid, condemned the bombings today as "criminal
acts" and "an aggression, an act of killing, terrorizing others
and destruction," as well as "bloodshed of protected souls."
In Medina, the imam of the Prophet Mosque, Ali bin Abdel Rahman al-Hudhaify,
said that while Muslims were "required to punish any fellow Muslims
who violate Islamic teachings," they should also ask the West "to
punish those who commit terrorist acts against the Palestinians and to
guarantee their right to live in peace and dignity in their homeland."
The imam at Abu Bakr Mosque here, Mazin al-Raji, said the attacks posed
a test that separated believers from nonbelievers. Believers, he said,
understood that the bombers were "mentally twisted and unstable"
people whose conduct was also an act of treason against the state and
against human nature.
But the imam also cited conditions in Chechnya, the Palestinian territories
and Iraq, and warned that arresting people and suppressing their opinions
could "create another reason for terrorism."
Taken together, these comments seem to suggest that while the bombings
may have stirred a new resolve among Saudis to fight terrorism, there
is a wide gulf between Riyadh and Washington on policy issues like postwar
Iraq and the Middle East peace talks.
The American death toll from the attacks reached nine today, one more
than previously believed, because the charred body of one victim was finally
identified.
American investigators who arrived on Thursday night were preparing for
meetings with their Saudi counterparts to pursue leads on the attacks.
In the past, American officials have complained about the lack of Saudi
support for investigations of Islamic terrorism, particularly on the complex
and hidden financing of militant groups with connections in this country.
This week American officials said they were more hopeful because Monday's
attacks had provoked widespread condemnation in Saudi Arabia, as well
as a feeling of vulnerability.
Many worshipers today, commenting on recent events, pointed not simply
to the bomb attacks but to their connection with a shootout last week
between Saudi security forces and occupants of a house where large numbers
of weapons were found, and with the government's issuing of the names
and pictures of 19 alleged terrorists.
One of the bomb attacks on Monday, at the Jadawel International luxury
housing complex, occurred a couple of thousand feet from the site of the
shootout, and some officials have linked some of the 19 suspects to the
attacks. All of these well-publicized events appear to have merged into
compelling evidence of homegrown terrorism in Saudi eyes.
In this conservative society, where the secret police are a pervasive
presence and foreigners keep to themselves in their off hours in perhaps
a thousand walled compounds throughout the country, sermons are sometimes
considered a reflection of the nation's true feelings, and anti-American
sermons are believed by some to incite acts of violence.
For that reason, officials at various embassies monitor sermons, especially
those at mosques famous for scathing tirades against the West and expressions
of sympathy for militants like Osama bin Laden. It is not hard to do so,
since the Friday sermons are blared by loudspeakers throughout the city.
American officials say they have been encouraged that the anti-American
tone of sermons has been more subdued since Sept. 11, 2001. They note
that of the nation's 100,000 imams, a few hundred of the most vitriolic
ones have been dismissed by the government in recent months.
The Abu Bakr Mosque is known to have had fiery anti-American sermons
on occasion, but today's contained no such preaching. Worshipers were
also careful to offer only polite criticism of American policies.
One worshiper, though, said that while he condemned the killing of innocent
Americans at their compounds in Saudi Arabia, the killing of Americans
in Iraq was different. "If they are killing an enemy in Iraq, we
will be happy," he said.
Ali Obidy, a general director of a computer center in Riyadh, said: "Unfortunately,
Iraqis suffer from this kind of bad action. Everyone here rejects these
acts, but clearly there is a bad balance in American policy toward Jews
on one side and Palestinians and Muslims on the other side."
He said that American policies in Afghanistan and Iraq "will create
many bin Ladens."
Abdul Rahman, a military officer, said that terrorism was "the responsibility
of every Saudi citizen" and that relations with the United States
were good as far as he was concerned.
"It was not only Americans who died," he said. "It was
people of all nationalities. To shed their blood is totally forbidden
by Islam."
As for the opinions of others across the country, a doctor at King Faisal
Hospital said that 18 physicians in his department were unanimous in their
condemnation of the attacks, as were the other people he has spoken with
since the blasts.
"Some are shocked," he said. "Some are angry. But 95 percent
of the people reject this terrorist attack against civilians."
Nonetheless, the doctor said, something must be done to solve the crisis
in the Middle East, where peace can be achieved once Israel withdraws
from the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
"We know the U.S. cannot abandon Israel," he said. "But
Israel is accepted in the Arabic world. The U.S. should recognize that."
A Muslim World Torn
Hatred of Hussein Limits the Willingness Of Many to Seek Vengeance Against
West
By Glenn Frankel
Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, April 6, 2003; Page A01
LONDON, April 5 -- For Muslims throughout the world, the war in Iraq
has set off a wave of anger, sadness, frustration and despair.
What it hasn't done, so far at least, is produce a flood of jihadist
recruits willing to die for President Saddam Hussein's cause, or a backlash
strong enough to topple Arab governments with close ties to the West,
according to interviews conducted over the past week with Muslims around
the world.
The televised daily scenes of civilian casualties, humiliated Iraqi prisoners
of war and triumphant American warriors rolling through southern Iraq
have left a bitter taste in the mouths of millions. But political Islam,
a potent if divided force, appears torn between its fear and suspicion
of the West and its long-standing hatred of Hussein, who is perceived
as one of the most secular and totalitarian of Arab leaders.
"Muslims are depressed and angry, and many are praying not just
for an end to the war but for America to be defeated," said Azzam
Tamimi, director of the Institute of Islamic Political Thought here. "But
that doesn't mean they support the regime -- Islamists have always hated
Saddam, although some of them may begin to see him as a hero because he
is fighting the Americans."
From London to Cairo to Jakarta, these raw, divided emotions were on
display this past week as Muslims sought to respond to the carnage of
war. While some Muslims in the Middle East sought unsuccessfully to make
their way to Baghdad to fight and die alongside their Iraqi brethren,
the vast majority there and in Europe and Asia sat by helplessly.
Two decades ago, the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan inspired a generation
of Islamic warriors -- trained and funded by Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and
the United States -- to launch a jihad, or holy war. The Afghan mujaheddin
brought about the Soviet defeat in Afghanistan. And led by Osama bin Laden,
some veterans of that struggle participated in the Sept. 11, 2001, terror
attacks on the United States.
This time, no major government appears prepared to help a new generation
of jihadists take on the West. Instead, government crackdowns following
the Sept. 11 attacks have made it harder for radicals to preach, raise
funds or recruit followers.
At the same time, the wave of popular opposition to the war outside of
the United States and the huge antiwar protests of recent months have
created new ties between Muslims and mainstream communities in Europe,
and eased the Muslim sense of alienation.
"Despite language barriers and cultural barriers, people did come
together and found they shared a huge common ground," said Anas Altikriti,
28, an Iraqi native who does volunteer work for the Muslim Association
of Britain. "This was enormously positive for Muslims all over Europe,
especially young people who otherwise might be extremely alienated."
Security officials in Britain, France and a host of other nations say
they have seen no signs yet that the war has produced a new wave of recruits
or activity on behalf of the al Qaeda terrorist network. But there is
little doubt that the war has created new sympathy for the organization
among Muslims. Ramazan Ucar, imam at the Centrum-Mosque in Hamburg, Germany,
the city where some of the Sept. 11 attacks were planned, had publicly
condemned the terror attacks. Now, he says, he feels differently.
"I prayed for the victims after the 11th of September," he
said, " but today I would say if something like this attack happens
again in the U.S.A., I would not pray for them."
Some of the more radical positions taken by Muslim clerics reflect internal
struggles between rival Islamic groups. In Russia, for example, a top
Muslim leader this week declared holy war against the United States, but
was immediately rebuked by a rival Muslim cleric who urged Russia's 20
million Muslims to confine their opposition to prayer and charitable donations.
Still, many analysts expect a sharp increase in terrorism. A Western
diplomat in Riyadh said popular anger and anti-American sentiment have
raised the potential for terror attacks against Western targets in Saudi
Arabia to a higher level than has been seen in "a long, long time."
Others experts warn of attacks against pro-American leaders in Saudi Arabia,
Jordan, Kuwait and Oman in response to what one radical here called "the
treachery of the self-appointed rulers of the Arabian Peninsula."
In Jakarta, Robin Bush, director of the Islam and Civil Society program
for the Asia Foundation in Jakarta, said: "The anger against the
United States is very strong and is widespread across the board. The repercussions
will be felt for a long time."
What follows are portraits from three capitals -- Cairo, London and Jakarta
-- that reflect both the rising anger and limited actions that have so
far marked political Islam's response to the war.
In Cairo: Authorities
Take Subtle Steps to Block Way to Jihad
In Jakarta: War
Boosts the Shipment of Aid, Not Fighters, to Iraq
In London: Radical
Islam Placed Under Tight Control
Correspondent Sharon LaFraniere in Moscow, staff writer Carol Morello
in Riyadh, and special correspondents Caroline Huot in Paris, Alia Ibrahim
in Beirut, and Souad Mekhennet and Shannon Smiley in Berlin contributed
to this report.
Muslim Clerics in Pakistan Call for Jihad against United States
and Allies
On 24 March in Karachi, Pakistan, fourteen Islamic clerics called for
"a holy war or jihad against the United States and its allies because
of their attack on Iraq," Reuters reported. Among the clerics was
prominent pro-Taliban Islamic scholar, Maulana Mufti Nizamuddin Shamzai.
While a statement released by the group did not provide specific actions
to take, it did say "jihad had become mandatory on Muslims since
President (George) Bush's announcement of a crusade" following the
attacks of 11 September 2001, and that "the attack on Iraq has intensified
this conflict. Every Muslim should participate in the holy war according
to his capacity." Accusing the U.S. of attempting to control Iraqi
oil wealth and undermine Islamic regimes, the statement also said, "Muslims
will never tolerate this. Temporary defeat will not disappoint them."
ANALYSIS: A proponent of the hardline Deobandi school of Islamic thought,
Shamzai, issued a call for jihad against the U.S.-led military campaign
in Afghanistan that began in October 2001. The government of President
Pervez Musharraf met strong criticism for its support of the U.S. campaign
and the war on terrorism, and although it opposes the war against Iraq,
the call to jihad by the Muslim clerics is further indication by religious
groups that they do not feel such opposition has been demonstrative enough.
Female captive first since Pentagon altered rule
Joyce Howard Price
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Published March 24, 2003
One of the five U.S. soldiers captured by Iraqi forces and questioned
on Iraqi television is the first female POW since the Clinton administration's
military leaders repealed a rule barring servicewomen from positions with
a high risk of encountering enemy fire or capture.
In 1994, the Pentagon, under Defense Secretary Les Aspin, discarded the
"Risk Rule" and authorized women to serve in any post other
than in frontline infantry, special-operations forces, or armor or artillery
units.
The Pentagon was swayed by feminists, said Elaine Donnelly, president
of the Military Readiness Center, an independent public policy organization
that specializes in military personnel issues.
"It's bad when a man is captured. But if a woman is captured, she
doesn't have the same chance [to defend herself] that a man does,"
said Mrs. Donnelly.
Both Mrs. Donnelly and retired Army Lt. Col. Robert Maginnis said when
they learned of the woman's capture, they thought about a female POW from
the 1991 Persian Gulf war who was sexually assaulted by Iraqis.
Col. Maginnis, a Fox News analyst, said no one should be surprised if
a female POW is sexually assaulted.
"You must consider that women in every society are preyed upon if
they are overtaken. ... Now that women are closer to the front lines,
they are more subject to becoming captives and being manipulated,"
he said.
Published reports say women are allowed to hold 52 percent of active-duty
positions in the Marines, about a twofold increase since the rule change,
while women in the Army can hold 70 percent of such positions. Women in
the Air Force and Navy can perform in 99 percent of active-duty positions,
about a 30 percent increase since 1993.
A recent study from the think tank RAND noted that the services limit
the number of women they recruit for certain occupations. A previous study
said about 10 percent of military women favor combat roles for females.
Iraqi footage of the POWs, replayed on the Qatar-based Al Jazeera network,
also shows the bodies of at least four other soldiers, some of whom appear
to have been shot through the head.
U.S. officials last night said 12 soldiers were unaccounted for but did
not release the names of the five POWs who wire service reports said were
from the Army's 507th Maintenance unit out of Fort Bliss, Texas. A 6 p.m.
press conference at Fort Bliss was canceled last night.
Col. Maginnis said people in both maintenance and transportation units
are vulnerable to capture. But he said those in support units do not receive
the same training in escape and survival as other soldiers. There simply
is not enough time, he said.
Fox News said yesterday that it was told that personnel in the 507th Maintenance
unit received basic combat training.
"We clearly need to reconsider the decision made in the early 1990s
for the good of the country and the good of women," said Col. Maginnis.
Prior to the Risk Rule change, servicewomen were also barred from even
support roles for combat troops, said Mrs. Donnelly, who suspected that
a woman would be among the captives when she heard they were from the
Army's 507th.
Mrs. Donnelly said it bothers her that Maj. Rhonda Cornum, the flight
surgeon for the Army's 2-229th Attack Helicopter Battalion who was captured
by Iraqis 12 years ago, didn't tell the public about her sexual abuse
for four years.
"She was a staunch advocate of women in combat, and she withheld
that information. ... If the world had known what happened to her, it
might have changed the debate," said Mrs. Donnelly.
A second woman captured and later released in the first Gulf war has not
said whether she was sexually assaulted, Mrs. Donnelly said.
Realities and Myths of Islamic Suicidal Terrorism
Lev Navrozov
Friday, Feb. 21, 2003
In 1895, H.G. Wells, author of many futuristic projections, described
the terrorism of the future: A terrorist will use not explosives, able
to kill only dozens or hundreds or thousands of people at most, but pathogenic
microbes, thus infecting the water mains of a city to kill millions of
people, who may in turn infect other dozens of millions of people all
over a country.
Yet in more than a hundred years after this prophecy, suicidal terrorism
by means of explosives has not been replaced by suicidal bioterrorism,
though there are far more and better opportunities to buy, steal or produce
(in a "home laboratory") far more potent pathogenic microbes
and viruses.
Wells was not a profound psychologist. Like most Westerners, he did not
understand the suicidal terrorist's psychology. Dostoyevsky understood
it far better - partly because terrorism was rampant in Russia in his
time. As for death, Dostoyevsky himself was sentenced to death, and stood
on the scaffold waiting for execution until it was announced that his
death sentence had been commuted to hard labor.
A suicidal terrorist is, according to Dostoyevsky, the only absolutely
free person on earth - he is independent of anyone and of anything on
earth. He lives/dies for his death/murder, and he wants to die in a pyre
and with a terrific bang, not a whimper, and, if he is a Moslem, to ascend
in a pyre of fire and thunder to paradise, where he will deflower heavenly
virgins all the time and forever.
How many millions of Americans could those 19 suicidal terrorists have
killed on Sept. 11, 2001, if they had bought (from China, for example)
pathogenic microbes or viruses, as Wells had described the future terrorism
in 1895? But no! Give them on this earth three giant funeral pyres (with
a lot of gasoline!) before their heavenly bliss of the eternal bridal
night.
Would the population of Israel have survived if the terrorists had been
buying and using pathogenic microbes or viruses? Not to mention that the
terrorists using microbes and viruses might well stay alive. No! A terrorist
in Israel is ready to kill just one Israeli, but he himself must die in
a blast of fire and thunder. His ritual fire-and-thunder suicide seems
to be more important to him than the killing of Israelis. Typically, he
does not throw his bomb: He's wearing it.
For about a year and a half, following Sept. 11, American government
officials and TV guests with university degrees in the humanities, whose
life experiences are confined to their sheltered micro-worlds of "salaries,
bonuses and benefits," have been explaining how they would eradicate
global suicidal terrorism.
This is really simple: In their perception, no suicidal terrorist can
kill himself and others on his own, without an organization or a government.
To imagine that he can act on his own is as absurd as to imagine that
a government official does not receive his salary from a government or
that a professor is not affiliated with a university but lectures on his
own.
The only question is to which organization and government a suicidal
terrorist belongs. There are 60 terrorist organizations, but many of them
have Arabic names, difficult for those U.S. government officials and TV
guests who do not know a single foreign language.
Fortunately, two names have been repeated in the mainstream television
many times a day for the past year and a half: Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda.
Osama is a coward who has been bragging for over 10 years about how he
will kill all "Jews and Crusaders [Christians]" (in that order),
and U.S. government officials and TV guests have been taking his stupid
bragging for a heinous criminal's confessions.
Out of the fortune he inherited ($300 million) he has been paying $1
a day to whoever will brag with him of their suicidal terrorist exploits.
Flashed together onto the U.S. TV screens are the pictures of bin Laden
(with his Kalashnikov from the times of the anti-Soviet guerrilla war
in Afghanistan), of his $1-a-day hirelings, of the guerrilla camps of
25 years ago, and of terrorist attacks such as that of Sept. 11, 2001.
Hence many Americans believe that the stupid bragging coward and his
$1-a-day hirelings are responsible for virtually all terrorist attacks
on earth. This is a conditioned reflex. Thus the Pavlovian dog begins
to salivate when the bell rings because the poor animal associates the
ringing of the bell with meat. In the same way, many Americans associate
bin Laden and al-Qaeda with terrorism.
Though bin Laden brags of killing "Jews and the Crusaders"
(in that order), I have never heard bin Laden or any al-Qaeda bragging
of their terrorism in Israel. Why not?
You see, those Palestinian suicidal boys are quite tough, and should
they have heard, at any time in the past 10 years, of bin Laden or an
al-Qaeda "terrorist," bragging of their imaginary exploits in
Israel, a Palestinian terrorist would have taken bin Laden by his beard
and smashed him against the wall so that the braggart croaked then and
there, and a similar treatment would have been given to the $1-a-day al-Qaeda
braggart.
While every suicidal terrorist, in the TV perception, kills himself and
others strictly on the orders of some organization - usually al-Qaeda,
since the name has become the "meat" in the TV-induced conditioned
reflex, even bin Laden himself is "linked" with a government.
Thus, in 2001 he was "linked" with the Taliban government of
Afghanistan, which called for the war on Afghanistan, but he fled so nimbly
that the key goal of the war was not met.
Now he is "linked" with Saddam Hussein's government in Iraq,
which calls for the war on Iraq. You see, Saddam will give bin Laden "the
weapons of mass destruction" and then bin Laden is sure to kill all
"Jews and Crusaders" with the help of his al-Qaeda.
But surely bin Laden, with his inherited $300 million, could have bought
five or 10 or 15 years ago, say, plague bacteria at $100 a vial, the price
at which Saddam Hussein bought it from a U.S. company in the 1980s. Another
source is, of course, China, which also sells "weapons of mass destruction."
As far as I know, the U.S. government has never promised to eradicate
in the United States common crimes, such as murder. Within one year after
Sept. 11, 2001, at least five times as many Americans died as a result
of murder than as a result of the "terrorist attack" of Sept.
11. Five Sept. 11 attacks within one year!
No one has heard of measures to decrease the murder rate. But suicidal
terrorism? Let us wage enough wars against small and technologically third-rate
countries like Iraq, spend enough trillions of dollars on new huge bureaucracies,
be vigilant - and suicidal terrorism will be eradicated, in contrast to
common crime such as murder.
Yet a suicidal terrorist is much more unpredictable, elusive, hard to
catch than a common criminal such as a murderer. He cannot be swayed by
any earthly rewards or promises. He is not human - he is a corpse beyond
all human weakness, and with only one goal - to die in a suicidal-murderous
pyre, ascending him to the eternal bridal night, if he is a Moslem.
A common murderer usually continues to live after the murder, and this
is usually when he is caught if at all. A suicidal terrorist dies - vanishes
from the earth, and a German friend of mine, writing a book on the subject,
has a hard time guessing why 14 out of the 19 terrorists of Sept. 11,
2001, were Saudis and their conspiracy originated at a Hamburg university,
in Germany.
* * * * * *
Hundreds of my NewsMax.com readers have expressed their wish to receive
the link to the Web site that is to serialize in weekly installments my
book "Out of Moscow and into New York: A Life in the Geostrategically
Lobotomized West in the Age of Terrorism and Post-Nuclear Superweapons."
Unfortunately, the creation of the Web site by a hosting company has been
going on for two and a half months, but it is not yet ready.
I wish to thank my readers for their patience, interest and wonderful
e-mails, and to tell them that I will let them know by e-mail the link
to the Web site as soon as it is ready. I hope that more readers will
express through e-mail (navlev@cloud9.net)
their wish to know the link to the Web site when it is ready to serialize
my book in weekly installments.
February 19, 2003
Americans Abroad Face Anger at U.S.
By JANE PERLEZ
JAKARTA, Indonesia, Feb. 18 - These are uneasy, tense times for Americans
living abroad. As the possibility of war against Iraq rises, especially
a war that the United States may fight virtually alone, so does anti-Americanism
in the streets, newspapers and cafes of foreign cities.
Interviewed around the world, Americans expressed confidence that people
nearly everywhere tried to distinguish between them and their government.
But they acknowledged that anger over American policies - and resentment
of American power - had translated into varying degrees of wariness, discomfort
and even risk for Americans living in different parts of the world.
In some places, like Pakistan and Egypt, old pique at the United States
is now fortified by fury at what many people see as the Bush administration's
hostility to Islam.
In Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim country, the outpouring
of opposition to a war against Iraq is likely to be substantial. The American
Embassy in Jakarta is taking no chances. A potential war brings "a
situation so fraught with uncertainty," the embassy said, that families
of American diplomats evacuated last fall after the Bali terrorist attack
will not be allowed to return.
In the Middle East, too, some American embassies have started to send
home the families of diplomats and nonessential staff members. The question
whether American executives and their families should follow this example
is an issue for many corporations.
In both the Middle East and Indonesia, schools attended by American children
have been turned into virtual fortresses. Some international schools have
asked students to keep several days of clothing in their lockers in case
they are unable to leave the campus.
Even in Africa, where people are so beset by their own daily tribulations,
anti-Americanism simmers in some corners.
Beyond concerns for their physical safety, Americans abroad, no matter
what their location or political persuasion, are faced anew with troubling
questions.
Why have feelings of sympathy for America after Sept. 11, 2001, been transformed
in Europe to sullen resentment?
Why is what the writer Fouad Ajami calls the "unfathomable anti-Americanism"
in Egypt so prevalent, even among wealthy and educated people with the
deepest ties to the West?
Why, in so many places, has the allure of the United States as a promoter
of democracy and champion of the little guy been replaced with rage at
its power?
Pakistan
Most Dangerous Spot for Americans
KARACHI, Pakistan - Don Graybiel, a soft-spoken 54-year-old music, English
and social studies teacher from Port Huron, Mich., does not talk politics
with his Pakistani friends. But he still hears the anger. His seventh-grade
students express it to him.
"They are really ticked off at the attitude Americans have that their
lives are more valuable than the life of a Pakistani or an Afghani,"
he said. "There is a sort of sour taste for America in this part
of the world."
Mr. Graybiel, an Air Force veteran, lives in what may be one of the most
dangerous spots on the planet for an American: Karachi, the site of a
series of terrorist attacks against Americans and other Westerners last
year.
Hard-line religious parties won a record 20 percent of Parliament seats
in recent elections, including three in Karachi. There is rising disenchantment
with American policies in Iraq, Israel and Afghanistan, and with a new
immigration crackdown aimed at males from Pakistan and other Muslim countries.
Since the Sept. 11 attacks, Mr. Graybiel has lived a life curtailed by
security concerns. Four guards armed with shotguns and rifles follow him
in a chase car wherever he drives. His home has three armed guards on
duty at all times. The school where he works, the American School in Karachi,
is a fortress. (The school has no American students and only a handful
of American teachers; the rest have left.)
But while he takes precautions, like shopping in only certain areas of
Karachi, he says he is not consumed by worry. He feels no threat from
the Pakistanis he interacts with and counts them among his closest friends.
He has just signed up for a fifth year in Pakistan, a country he says
gets a bum rap. The Muslims he knows abhor Al Qaeda's tactics, he said.
"It's not the teachings of Muhammad," he said. "Just like
the K.K.K. are not the teachings of Christ."
He said he understood some of the frustrations Pakistanis feel toward
the United States. He criticized the attitudes some Americans bring to
Pakistan.
"There is a contingent of Americans here who think they have carte
blanche," he said. "that we can go and do anything we want."
As a possible war with Iraq looms, he is not panicked, but he also knows
that he is not invincible. "I think it's going to happen," he
said. "But I don't know what is going to happen because of it."
DAVID ROHDE
Egypt
Told to Go Home, He Keeps Returning
CAIRO - Mark Goldrup knows that not all Egyptians welcome his presence
here, but he keeps coming back.
A 31-year-old aid worker, Mr. Goldrup has lived in Egypt sporadically
since 1994 and can vividly remember one of the few times an Egyptian expressed
hostility toward him in the neighborhood he now calls home.
"I was shopping in Maadi, and a respectable-looking middle-aged man
with a beard came up to me and said, `You should go home.' " That
was in 1997, after a massacre of tourists in Luxor. The same year, he
went home to finish his master's degree in creative writing.
Over the years, Mr. Goldrup has noticed that Egyptians wanted to talk
to him about American policy in the Middle East and that many were adamant
in their opposition. "When Egyptians talk about politics, they either
seem to be angry or to say things about America that I disagree with,"
he said. "I found that when I dealt with such conversations in a
friendly and cool way and expressed my opinions, most Egyptians, as much
as they might dislike America on any given day, do not expect me to dislike
America."
Mr. Goldrup returned to Egypt in 1999, and he now edits a newsletter for
an international environmental organization.
A bachelor with an Egyptian girlfriend, he says that his American friends
in Maadi felt fearful during the Persian Gulf war in 1991, when he was
out of the country, but that nothing happened. In other periods, he himself
has felt tension.
"I noticed a difference in how people treated me after the start
of the Aksa uprising in the fall of 2000," he said, referring to
the clashes between Israelis and Palestinians. "Maybe I was paranoid,
but I started to feel that some Egyptians would look at me in a different
way, or when I mentioned I was American, some would go cold for a minute
before returning to normal."
He said he did not know how to feel about a new war. "I do not feel
threatened," he said, but added, "I do not know really what
it is going to be like if there is a war on Iraq."
ABEER ALLAM
Kenya
Chilling Encounter With Man on Bus
NAIROBI, Kenya - Sister Mary Ellen Howard, 60, has lived in Kenya for
most of the last 24 years, long enough to pick up some Swahili, develop
a taste for the Kenyan cornmeal staple known as ugali and feel a bond
with the poorest of the country's poor.
She lives on the edge of Eastleigh, a rough-and-tumble neighborhood in
Nairobi made up mostly of Somali immigrants; she works with handicapped
children in Manjengo, one of the capital's many slums.
Even Good Samaritans need vacations, and so Sister Howard hopped on a
local bus in late November and headed for the Kenyan coast.
It proved to be a jarring trip.
Sister Howard (who is a nun of the Notre Dame order) is a friendly sort,
so she thought nothing of striking up a conversation with the Muslim man
sitting next to her on the bus. She tried first in Swahili and then switched
to English. Everything was going fine until she acknowledged that she
was an American.
"When I said I was from the States, he got so upset," she said.
"He said we were trying to rule the world. He said that over and
over. Then he said if he could have been in one of those planes that crashed
in New York on Sept. 11, he would have been."
Stunned, Sister Howard tried to persuade the angry man that she and her
government were not the same.
"I told him I want to be a person of peace," she said. "He
told me that an American couldn't bring peace. Then he said he had to
change his seat because I was going to give him a heart attack."
Sister Howard was nevertheless surprised and slightly offended as the
man got up from his seat and sat down next to another Kenyan.
Her vacation proceeded without incident, although the day after she returned
to Nairobi, terrorists struck in Mombasa, leveling a tourist hotel frequented
by Israelis and narrowly missing a planeload of tourists on their way
back to Israel. "So much suffering," she said.
Sister Howard has gone on with her life, one that is as close to the people
of Kenya as it always has been. She has experienced no other incidents
but is constantly bracing for them. She has a wish: that American policymakers
from President Bush on down try living overseas themselves, not in fancy
hotels or expatriate enclaves, but with everyday people, some of whom
may not like them very much.
"I felt overwhelmed, but it made me reflect," she said of her
conversation with the man on the bus. "What kind of people are we?
Why do people think this way?"
MARC LACEY
Germany
Skepticism About U.S. and Its Motives
FRANKFURT - Joshua B. Kalish, a 38-year-old consultant from New Jersey
who has lived in Frankfurt for a year, says that when he asks Germans
their opinion about the White House's campaign against Saddam Hussein,
they answer in a single word: oil.
"A lot of them tend to think it's a bit of a farce," he said.
"They're pretty cynical about it."
Mr. Kalish said that in his conversations, Germans voiced belief that
the United States was only paying lip service to the role of the United
Nations. Many question the need for an attack against Iraq, given what
they see as a lack of evidence turned up by the weapons inspectors and
the fact that the United States is pursuing diplomacy with North Korea.
This skepticism about Washington's motives, Mr. Kalish said, is part of
a broader distaste for America's domination in global affairs. "A
lot of Germans resent the fact that the United States feels it has the
right to intervene anywhere," he said over coffee. "They think
it's unfair."
Still, Mr. Kalish said he believed that most Germans made a point of distinguishing
between the United States government, about which they are often sharply
critical, and its people, to whom they remain generally friendly.
Though he said his American friends had become more cautious about advertising
their nationality, he said he was not guarded about being an American
living abroad.
Last year, he and his wife and two children skipped a Fourth of July party
because he felt that it was a risk. But otherwise, he has not changed
his behavior.
"I've seen no evidence of a backlash," he said. "You walk
on the streets of Frankfurt and you can count more than 10 New York Yankee
wool caps on the way to work."
But embracing American popular culture, which Germans do unabashedly,
is not the same as endorsing its foreign policy, he said. As an American,
he is sometimes asked by Germans what he thinks is going on in President
Bush's head.
"I tell them I don't have any more answers than they do," he
said.
MARK LANDLER
Indonesia
Close Personal Ties, but New Wariness
JAKARTA, Indonesia - LeRoy Hollenbeck, a development specialist, has
lived in Indonesia for 21 years, speaks the language and works with an
all-Indonesian staff.
Because of his close ties to the people and his familiarity with the culture,
Mr. Hollenbeck, 52, says he remains essentially at ease here. But the
terrorist attack on Bali in October and the looming war against Iraq have
injected a new sense of wariness, especially when he steps into the streets
of Jakarta, a crowded capital city.
"I feel less secure, but that doesn't mean I'm afraid," he said.
Indonesia is the most populous Muslim country in the world, and the newspapers
here are filled with news about a possible war with Iraq. Strains of anti-Americanism
lie beneath the surface.
In the aftermath of the Bali attack, the families of American diplomats
and nonessential employees at the United States Embassy were sent home
last fall. Because Mr. Hollenbeck's work is financed by the United States
Agency for International Development, his wife, Philomenia, was among
those evacuated. His two grown sons live in the United States.
Unlike many Americans here, he lives in an apartment complex where all
the other residents are Indonesian.
"Other Americans here who do not speak the language and have children
in school are more concerned," he said.
Still, a conspicuous figure in a Asian city - he is 6 foot 1 inch with
graying hair - Mr. Hollenbeck is taking modest precautions.
He goes to shopping malls less: once a month, instead of once a week.
He said he felt pangs of anxiety the other day when he walked to lunch
with colleagues from the office along one of the busiest streets.
"We were walking for about 12 minutes, and I wondered if people were
looking at me more than usual," he said. "But that passed relatively
quickly."
The companionship of Indonesian colleagues gives him a sense of reassurance,
he said. Moreover, his Indonesian friends "never give me the sense
they look at me differently now."
He lived for many years in some of the outer provinces of Indonesia, where
he still travels for work. When he goes to those areas, he feels safe
in familiar places, he said.
Indonesians out there, he said, are "less concerned with world events
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