FROM ROAD MAP TO ROADKILL
So in the new Condoleezza Rice era how’s it all looking? Here’s two good articles about the Middle East and post-Fallujah Iraq. Death, Delusion and Democracy : “The Palestinians - the victims of 39 years of occupation - must prove themselves worthy of peace with their occupiers. The death of their leader is therefore billed as a glorious occasion that provides hope. All this is part of the self-delusion of Bush and Blair. The reality is that the outlook in the Middle East is bleaker than ever.” Full article here. And from John Kampfner: “Even "new Europe" has now parted from Tony Blair on Iraq. The PM has been reduced to phoning Hungary's centre-right opposition, begging it to scupper plans to withdraw troops. Where others bridle, Blair has adapted himself to the second coming of Bush with characteristic ease. He knows his fate is inextricably linked with that of his senior partner. The two are in it together, as their forces reduce Fallujah to rubble. Months ago, Blair allowed himself to be convinced by the Americans that only a military assault on the town would quell the rebellion. Yet British military planners and diplomats work from the assumption that the main organisers of the insurgency slipped out of town long ago and are regrouping elsewhere. There is little expectation now of a reduction in the violence. The withdrawal of the Iraqi Islamic Party, the main Sunni grouping, from the interim government and the boycotting of the planned elections by the Sunnis' most prominent clerics have further dented any lingering hopes of political unity. Even if the elections do take place as planned in the last week of January, they cannot produce the definitive moment of democracy on which Blair, Bush and their man in situ, President Iyad Allawi, had been banking.” More at Kampfner here...
