Israfax
October 8, 2001/5762 - Volume XIII, Number 238

ISRAFAX EDITORIAL
After the Twin Towers: Facing Death and Evil, Choose Life
Frederick Krantz
As the New Year begins, the ruins of the Twin Towers in New York and at the Pentagon in Washington, burial sites of over 6,000 persons, still smolder. We stand on the verge of a new and uncertain era as a terrible new war--worldwide and long-term--has begun. Some are already calling it World War III.

President George W. Bush, sorely tested, is proving a determined leader. A consensus is, finally, emerging: terrorism is terrorism, murder is murder; no justification, no "root causes" can explain, and explain away, sheer evil.

America is the prime target of this evil, and only America has the resources, moral and material, to lead the civilized world to victory.

We are now, understandably, focused on the likely nerve-center of the American mass-murder, Osama Bin-Laden's Afghanistan--home to his international "Al-Quaida" ("The Base") network.

But make no mistake, he could not have brought off this, nor his other anti-American killings from the early 1990s on, alone.

States like Iran, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Syria and Afghanistan as well as the Palestinian territory, aid him and other terrorist operatives directly; groups in Egypt, Lebanon, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia support him indirectly. Money is raised by Islamic groups in Europe and Asia (Indonesia, Philippines, Malaysia), and in the U.S. and Canada.

We face today a mutually-reinforcing Terrorist International, the dismantling and destruction of which must be the overriding aim of the emerging American-led coalition. As former Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu put it recently, "America didn't simply attack the Japanese kamikazi pilots at the Battle of Midway, she sank their aircraft carriers". Without its "carriers", Islamic terrorism cannot be sustained.

A key technical term here is "regime-change". Diplomacy and the threat of force must be used either to push current rulers of Muslim states into active anti-terrorist measures, or to change those regimes should they refuse to cooperate.

The regime-change framework, clearly a major policy-shift, is not without its dangers. We should remember, however, the earlier success of the United States, unprepared in 1941 and after a ragged start and initial reverses, leading the allies in defeating powerful industrial-military states like Hitler's Germany and Imperial Japan.

Time is short, the terrorism will be ongoing, and experts fear not only more, and different, attacks, but the use of chemical and biological weapons. Fissile materials can be bought or stolen; Pakistan has nuclear weapons, and Iran and Iraq--thanks to UN incompetence and Chinese, French and Russian opportunism--are close to having them.

Sinking back into ineffectual Clintonesque masquerades (a few guided missiles here, bombing an irrelevant building there) will mean the Terrorist International has won. To avoid "the fire next time", we must act with all deliberate speed, now.

In the Hebrew Bible we are offered "the choice of life or death, blessing or curse. Choose life, and then you and your descendants will live...[Deut.30:19-29]". May all of us, this fateful New Year, have the courage, in facing down the faceless killers, to choose life.

(Frederick Krantz, Editor of ISRAFAX, is Director of the Canadian Institute for Jewish Research, and a professor of history at Concordia University in Montreal)

ROSH HASHANAH 5762
Baruch Cohen
This Rosh Hashanah marks one year since the explosion of the war of attrition, the terrorist war against the Jewish State, the State of Israel. This Rosh Hashanah 5762 was greeted by the Durban conference whose hateful slogans against the Jewish people were reminiscent of the pre-Second World War Nazi antisemitic incitement against the entire Jewish People. This year was greeted by terrorist attacks on U.S. soil, with the deaths of thousands at the destruction of the World Trade Center.

As a Holocaust survivor, the echoes coming from Durban and New York remind me of the darkest pages of human history: the annihilation of our People. Nevertheless, as Jews, we must prepare to welcome the year 5762 with strong, unshakable determination centered in the State of Israel, the state of all the Jews around the world. As we usher in the year 5762, we must remember the words of David ben Gurion: "Jerusalem has been and will remain forever the capital of the Jewish people."..."May God make peace upon us, and upon all Israel." Amen!

CIJR wishes all friends, members, and the entire House of Israel a 5762 with good health, tranquillity, and peace.

MEDIA DISTORTIONS

Lebanon Reacts to the News
Elisabetta Burba, an Italian Journalist
Where were you...when terrorists changed the world? I was in Beirut...enjoying the wonders of the ancient Phoenicians...This tour of past splendor only magnified the shock I received later...I realized that the offspring of this great civilization were celebrating...And I am not talking about destitute people. Those who were cheering [were] professionals wearing double-breasted suits, charming blonde ladies, pretty teenagers in tailored jeans...

Soon came reports of Palestinians celebrating. The BBC reporter in Jerusalem said it was only a tiny minority. Astonished, we asked some moderate Arabs if that was the case. "Nonsense," said one..."Ninety percent of the Arab world believes that Americans got what they deserved."...

[At a mosque] we were...approached by...one of the some 350,000 Palestinians who live in Lebanon...."My people have been crushed under the heel of American imperialism, which took away our land, massacred our beloved and denied our right to life. But have you seen what happened in New York City?...God is great--Allah u Akbar," he said...

On Thursday night, in the Christian northern part of Beirut we heard some loud noises. "Probably they are celebrating the attacks," someone told us..You mean the Maronite Christians are also celebrating? I asked. "Yes, they also feel betrayed by the Americans," came the response...

(Wall Street Journal, Europe edition, September 19, 2001)

Last Updated: May 13, 2002