I still wonder if the United States realizes how much planning went into this. When we talk about "mindless terrorists," we are lying to ourselves.

Robert Fisk

Categorized in : Lying Wonder Planning

I've never seen a single demonstration in Pakistan, in the streets of Gaza, in the West Bank, in which the people have come out with signs saying, "Please give us better roads. Please give us new prenatal clinics. Please give us a new sewage system." I'm sure they'd like those things, but it's not what they demand in the demonstrations. In the demonstrations, they talk about justice, they talk about an end to Israeli occupation.

justice giving people

Fundamentalism is not bred in poverty. There are plenty of poor countries in the world that don't have violence because amid the poverty there is a kind of justice and in some countries a democracy.

democracy justice country

People turn to violence, because they have no other avenue left. by Robert Fisk

People turn to violence, because they have no other avenue left.

turns violence people

Why is it that we go to immense lengths getting the Serbs who were responsible for the massacre of 7,000 at Srbrenica - that's slightly more than the total figure for New York - and we take them to a tribunal in The Hague, and one after another, we arraign them, try them, convict them, and punish them in front of the world, but no plans have been brought forward to get bin Laden and his friends and put them on trial?

trials new-york trying

It's very easy to start a war but the muftah, as the Arabs say, the key to switch off a war, is very difficult to find.

keys easy war

We live in a society in the West, where, when men do violent things, they do them under orders. They are soldiers carrying out orders or mafia men carrying out killings for bosses. But the way things happen in the Middle East is not the same as in the West.

boss men order

The word 'democracy' and the name of Assad do not blend very well... by Robert Fisk

The word 'democracy' and the name of Assad do not blend very well in much of Syria.

assad democracy names

A businessman admits that he 'let go' an employee because he was a Sunni Muslim. You simply have to look after yourself, he explains. I am shocked, like a good Westerner should be.

should letting-go looks

I wouldn't say I was part of an anti-war campaign. by Robert Fisk

I wouldn't say I was part of an anti-war campaign.

anti-war campaigns war

The Syrian army is tired of corruption. It is tired of party nepotism. It is becoming very angry with those it blames for the war.

tired party war

It is always an eerie experience to sit among Bashar al-Assad's s... by Robert Fisk

It is always an eerie experience to sit among Bashar al-Assad's soldiers.

als eerie soldier

In Palestine, the Israelis claim they found a land without people,' a Syrian officer explained to us. 'Now they will take southern Lebanon and claim they have found another land without people if these refugees do not return.

southern land people

Israel lost its war. Will Assad's enemies lose, too? by Robert Fisk

Israel lost its war. Will Assad's enemies lose, too?

israel war enemy

I do not make stories up, full stop. by Robert Fisk

I do not make stories up, full stop.

stories

President Bush will come here and there will be new "friends" of America to open a new relationship with the world, new economic fortunes for those who "liberated" them.

new-relationship president america

The [Israelis] believed - they were possessed of an absolute certainty and conviction - that 'terrorists' were in Chatila. How could I explain to them that the terrorists had left, that the terrorists had worn Israeli uniforms, that the terrorists had been sent into Chatila by Israeli officers, that the victims of the terrorists were not Israelis but Palestinians and Lebanese?

uniforms conviction victim

The sheer violence of it, the howl of air raid sirens and the air-cutting fall of the missiles carried its own political message; not just to President Saddam but to the rest of the world. We are the superpower, those explosions said last night. This is how we do business.

cutting night fall

Tanks come in two forms: the dangerous, deadly kind and the "libe... by Robert Fisk

Tanks come in two forms: the dangerous, deadly kind and the "liberating" kind.

tanks kind two

When you have a crime against humanity that is so awesome in scale and death, it is more than permissible to look around and say, who recently has been declaring war on the United States? Of course, the compass points straight to bin Laden.

united-states humanity war

In one way, I fear all Damascus is a dungeon. Or do you have to l... by Robert Fisk

In one way, I fear all Damascus is a dungeon. Or do you have to live here to appreciate that?

dungeons appreciate way