We just came back from seeing the Mariinsky Theatre of St. Petersburg's Kirov Ballet's performance of Le Corsaire at the Kennedy Center. Young Leonid Sarafanov stole the show (a pretty good show at that) as Ali, bringing the audience to life, receiving roaring applause and cheers (unusual enthusiasm for a Washington, DC crowd).
It must have been something like this when a young Baryshnikov or Nureyev first toured the USA. Keep an eye out for the 20-year old male dancer in future productions.
Sunday, July 10, 2005
Coffee: The Drink That Changed the World
Jonathan Yardley reviews Dark History by Antony Wild, the history of coffee. The theory: coffee helped people sober up from generations of beer drinking--and launched the modern intellectual revolution based in coffeehouses that led to Lloyd's of London, the Stock Exchange, and myriad other institutions we take for granted to day--not to mention the British Club...
Friday, July 08, 2005
London Was World Terrorism Capital
According to PittsburghLIVE.com:
If this is true, then democracy appears to be conducive to terrorism. Britain is also a wealthy, free-market economy.
As one counter-example disproves an erroneous universal claim, the London bombing explodes both George Bush's "Democracy" strategy for countering terrorism, along with his liberal critics' "Economic Development" strategy, which blames poverty.
Left standing is Daniel Pipes' political and ideological explanation--a theoretical approach shared by the Russians, Israelis, Indians and Chinese, among others...
London has long been home to many radical Islamic groups and preachers, so much so that it is often called 'Londonistan.' Sir John Stevens, former head of Scotland Yard, has estimated that up to 200 militants trained in Afghanistan's jihadist camps may live in England.
Rita Katz, director of the terrorism-monitoring SITE Institute, says London has 'a lot of jihadis, more than any other city in the Western world.'
'In London,' she says, 'what you have are the four factors of terrorism: recruitment, planning, financing and execution.'
If this is true, then democracy appears to be conducive to terrorism. Britain is also a wealthy, free-market economy.
As one counter-example disproves an erroneous universal claim, the London bombing explodes both George Bush's "Democracy" strategy for countering terrorism, along with his liberal critics' "Economic Development" strategy, which blames poverty.
Left standing is Daniel Pipes' political and ideological explanation--a theoretical approach shared by the Russians, Israelis, Indians and Chinese, among others...
Abu Hamza Link in London Blasts?
The New York Sun's Eli Lake reports on the Finsbury Mosque leader's connection to terrorism:
WASHINGTON - Just two days before yesterday's horrific attacks on London's mass-transit system, a British court began proceedings to deport a man widely believed to be Osama bin Laden's envoy to the United Kingdom.
Abu Hamza al-Masri, a former Afghan Mujahedeen warrior turned Islamic scholar, stood in the dock on July 5 in London to hear the government he so often pledged to destroy make the case that he has urged fellow believers to kill Britons.
Terrorism experts yesterday were careful not to draw a link between the attacks and Mr. Masri's case, saying the bombings were most likely linked to Al Qaeda's campaign against the West, but in many ways the two matters are deeply connected. The Finsbury Park mosque, where Mr. Masri, 48, often gave fiery sermons imploring his faithful to defend Muslims against an assault from the West is widely considered to be the training and indoctrination ground for the jihadist movement in England.
'The leadership of the European Islamists relocated from Germany to England in the late 1990s. The Finsbury Park mosque was the central point, the embassy, the nexus for many of these groups. It served as both a recruitment and indoctrination school,' a Hudson Institute terrorism analyst, Christopher Brown, told The New York Sun yesterday.
A former CIA analyst and current chief executive officer for the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies, Michael Swetnam, yesterday said the Finsbury mosque likely played an important role in the London attacks.
Putin: No "Double Standards" for Terrorists
The Moscow Times report:
President Vladimir Putin offered his condolences over Thursday's bomb attacks in London and said the attacks showed that the civilized world was not united enough in fighting terrorism.
Speaking at the Group of Eight summit in Gleneagles, Scotland, Putin also said there should be no 'double standards' in assessing terrorist attacks, in an apparent reference to bomb attacks in Russia that have claimed the lives of thousands of people.
'What happened today demonstrates yet again that we are doing too little to unite our efforts in the most effective way in the battle against terrorism,' Putin said.
There must not be any 'double standards whatsoever in assessing bloody crimes similar to those carried out in London today,' he said.
Victor Davis Hanson on the London Bombings
From VDH's Private Papers:
The jihadists expect that Westerners will slink out of the Middle East, allowing fascist fundamentalists to gain control of half the world's oil and thus buy enough weapons to blackmail their way back to the caliphate.
Destroying Israel, killing Christians in Africa, running Westerners out of the Middle East, Pakistan, Indonesia, or Bali, all that is mere relish. In Europe, the goal for the unhinged is the creation of another al Andalus; for the more calculating it is enough intimidation and terror to carve out zones of Muslim sanctuary, where millions can live parasite-like, within the largess of Western society, but without its bothersome liberal agenda of freedom and equality, in hopes of implanting the universal law of sharia.
So here we are. Even though the killers profess revenge equally for Afghanistan (the so-called 'right' war), they expect Westerners to scream 'Iraq.'
Even though such bombings are predicated on infiltration, careful stealthy reconnaissance, and long sojourns within London, expect cries of anguish and worrying about the stereotyping of Middle Eastern males.
Look for the same scripted crocodile tears and 'concern' from the Middle East's illegitimate leaders, even as much of the Islamic Street takes a secret delight in the daring of the jihadists, and the governments sense relief that the target was Westerners and not themselves.
Anticipate Western leaders condemning the terrorists in the same breadth as they call for 'eliminating poverty' and 'bringing them to justice' --as if the jihadists and their patrons are mere wayward and impoverished felons.
In the short term, Bush and Blair will appear as islands in the storm amid an angry and anguished public. But as 7/7 fades, as did 9/11, expect them to become even more unpopular, as the voices of appeasement assure us that if they just go away, maybe so will the terrorists.
It is our task, each of us according to our station, to speak the truth to all these falsehoods, and remember that we did not inherit a wonderful civilization just to lose it to the Dark Ages.
Mark Steyn on the London Bombings
From The Telegraph :
Today, the faraway country of which the British know little is Britain itself. Traditional terrorists - the IRA, ETA - operate close to home. Islamism projects itself long-range to any point of the planet with an ease most G8 militaries can't manage. Small cells operate in the nooks and crannies of a free society while the political class seems all but unaware of their existence.
Did we learn enough, for example, from the case of Omar Sheikh? He's the fellow convicted of the kidnapping and beheading in Karachi of the American journalist Daniel Pearl. He's usually described as 'Pakistani' but he is, in fact, a citizen of the United Kingdom - born in Whipps Cross Hospital, educated at Nightingale Primary School in Wanstead, the Forest School in Snaresbrook and the London School of Economics. He travels on a British passport. Unlike yours truly, a humble Canadian subject of the Crown, Mr Sheikh gets to go through the express lane at Heathrow.
Or take Abdel Karim al-Tuhami al-Majati, a senior al-Qa'eda member from Morocco killed by Saudi security forces in al Ras last April. One of Mr Majati's wives is a Belgian citizen resident in Britain. In Pakistan, the jihadists speak openly of London as the terrorist bridgehead to Europe. Given the British jihadists who've been discovered in the thick of it in Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Palestine, Chechnya and Bosnia, only a fool would believe they had no plans for anything closer to home - or, rather, 'home'.
Most of us can only speculate at the degree of Islamist penetration in the United Kingdom because we simply don't know, and multicultural pieties require that we keep ourselves in the dark.
Scottish Eyewitness Saw London Tube Bomber
Scotsman.com News reports:
Richard Jones, a passenger from Scotland, said he had just alighted from the bus when the bomb went off: 'I got ten yards away and the bus exploded,' he said.
'Basically, there was a young gentleman, an olive-skinned gentleman, in front of me and he kept diving into a bag at his feet. He became more and more agitated and so, on reflection, that may have been the bomber I was standing next to.'
Terence Mutasa, 27, a staff nurse at University College Hospital, said: 'I treated two girls in their twenties who were involved in the bus bomb. They were saying some guy came and sat down on the bottom deck and that he exploded.
They said the guy sat down and the explosion happened. They thought it was a suicide bomber.'
DEBKAfile: London Bombers Home-Grown
The Bombers were Suicide Killers from the UK, argues the not always reliable Debka.com.
The Counterterrorism Blog
Just found The Counterterrorism Blog in googling the London bombings. It looks like an interesting source of information.
Tony Blair: "We Will Hold True to the British Way of Life"
Statement from the PM following COBR meeting:
When they try to intimidate us, we will not be intimidated. When they seek to change our country or our way of life by these methods, we will not be changed. When they try to divide our people or weaken our resolve, we will not be divided and our resolve will hold firm. We will show, by our spirit and dignity, and by our quiet but true strength that there is in the British people, that our values will long outlast theirs. The purpose of terrorism is just that, it is to terrorise people, and we will not be terrorised.
I would like once again to express my sympathy and my sorrow to those families who will be grieving, so unexpectedly and tragically, tonight.? This is a very sad day for the British people, but we will hold true to the British way of life.
Thursday, July 07, 2005
Statement from G8 Leaders Marks Tipping Point in Terror War
The key sentence is in point 4: a reference to "fanaticism and extremism." The Russians and Chinese have stated a number of times that the war on terror is a war on "terrorism, fanaticism, and extremism." Until today, I never heard a British or American leader mention the last two. But now they've all signed onto the same page at the G8 summit, it seems. If true, this would mark a turning point in the right direction for the Global War on Terror.
Now that the G8 leaders appear have agreed the problem is ideological at base, perhaps Mssrs. Blair and Bush might stop supporting Palestinian, Chechen, Uighur, Uzbek and other Muslim Brotherhood inspired terrorists, fanatics, and extremists...
Statement from world leaders: Terrorist Attacks on London: "Statement by the G8, the Leaders of Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa and the Heads of the International Organisations represented here.
1. We condemn utterly these barbaric attacks. We send our profound condolences to the victims and their families. All of our countries have suffered from the impact of terrorism. Those responsible have no respect for human life. We are united in our resolve to confront and defeat this terrorism that is not an attack on one nation, but on all nations and on civilised people everywhere.
2. We will not allow violence to change our societies or our values. Nor will we allow it to stop the work of this Summit. We will continue our deliberations in the interests of a better world. Here at this Summit, the world's leaders are striving to combat world poverty and save and improve human life. The perpetrators of today's attacks are intent on destroying human life.
3. The terrorists will not succeed.
4. Today's bombings will not weaken in any way our resolve to uphold the most deeply held principles of our societies and to defeat those who would impose their fanaticism and extremism on all of us. We shall prevail. They shall not.
7 July 2005
Now that the G8 leaders appear have agreed the problem is ideological at base, perhaps Mssrs. Blair and Bush might stop supporting Palestinian, Chechen, Uighur, Uzbek and other Muslim Brotherhood inspired terrorists, fanatics, and extremists...
Did a "Covenant of Security" Protect the United Kingdom?
Listening to the BBC World Service coverage, I thought I heard an announcer say that the British felt safe from terror prior to the recent bombings because Europe provided a base for terrorists. Hard to believe, so I checked it out on the web and came up with this article; in whichDaniel Pipes argues the British had a deal with terrorists, prior to July 7th, called the "covenant of security":
If true, this theory might explain why indeed Britain did give asylum to Abu Hamza, Chechen warlords and Hizb-ut-Tahrir leaders, among other various and sundry terrorists, fanatics, and extremists--prior to the London bombings.
To the extent the allowing of Islamists and terrorists safe haven on British soil is a conscious decision to keep the UK safe at the expense of others, this is an immoral and despicable policy that must be changed immediately. (August 9, 2004)
If true, this theory might explain why indeed Britain did give asylum to Abu Hamza, Chechen warlords and Hizb-ut-Tahrir leaders, among other various and sundry terrorists, fanatics, and extremists--prior to the London bombings.
UKBlogs Aggregator on London Bombings
Link to the UKBlogs Aggregator (via Instapundit) for latest reports.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)