Omar Meet Rémy

Rémy Ourdan is Le Monde's rather interesting Baghdad correspondent whose articles have often been seen at NP (here, here, here and here).

Ourdan received what may be the hightest compliment for any French Middle East correspondent: back in February of 2003, he was criticized by ACriMed (Action critique des médias) for what they thought was an unfair portrait of the "human sheilds" : "The commitment of the pacifists who are traveling to Iraq under the threat of American bombing can be deemed courageous, suicidal, effective or ineffecitve. It deserves respect in any case. Rémy Ourdan, of Le Monde, seems to have nothing for them but contempt: he describes them as crazy, dishonest imbeciles, alienated from the Iraqis who 'want the war.' His effort at denigration in the guise of reporting deserves all the contempt normally reserved for those who take their ideas to extremes."

Indeed, Rémy. And have we said thanks often enough?

After yesterday's car bombing, Omar at Iraq the Model said, " I don't know why all we get (all of us) is pictures of a bunch of idiots throwing bricks at burned cars."

Well... he might have been happier with Ourdan's latest report, which contains some interesting details about the event:

Having come to the end of Saadoun street, already jammed with traffic at 8 am, the convoy doesn't see, or cannot get away from, a car that has crept among them. An explosion. The bomb set off by the kamikaze is very powerful. Passersby are cut down and neighborhood residents are crushed under the debris. Sixteen dead are counted, including five employees of General Electric, and more than sixty wounded. Among the five foreigners, there are two British, one American, one French and a Filipino. It is the second suicide attack in 24 hours in Baghdad.

The American occupier and the Iraqi government immediately condemned the attack. The prime minister, Iyad Allawi, who Iraqis hope will be able to restore security in the coming months, has promised "harsh measures" against the perpetrators of this sort of attack after June 30, when he will officially be in power. All officials are expecting attacks to get worse between now and June 30.

The divisions among Baghdadis are perfectly illustrated by the attitudes displayed in the minutes following the explosion. First there was a group of overexcited men who threw cans of beer found in a gutted store front into the brasier of the foreign 4x4s. Then there was a throng of around two hundred people who shouted "No to America!," burned a British flag found who knows where and who blame the attack on the Westerners alone, guilty of being present in Iraq.

Then there is Emad, a passerby met later in a café. "I was there just by chance, and I was ashamed," he says. "Ashamed to see Iraqis rejoicing at the sight of the bodies of those who have come to rebuild Iraq burning, ashamed to see my brothers exploiting the situation to loot the stores... I also want the Americans to leave Iraq, but not like this, not in violence and hatred." Emad is far from being the only one to think this.

"THIS IS NOT ISLAM"

Many Baghdadis, shocked by the images in April of Fallujah residents burning and hanging the cadavers of four American paramilitaries from a bridge, attributed this to the "savagery" of the somewhat roughnecked villagers. They were very shocked on Monday to see the scene repeated at the heart of their capital. "We've been invaded by these bandits who are liable to do anything," laments a shopkeeper. "These acts are not Islam. It is a perversion," says Emad.

Europeans Hardly Impressed by Obama's Position (or Lack Thereof) on Syria and Its WMD

Neither Le Monde's Plantu nor Le Monde's Serguei seem very impressed with Barack Obama's stance (or lack of stance) on Syria's chemical weapons…

(In defense of Obama, it's true that the Apologizer-in-Chief is far more occupied with "nation-building at home " and having to deal — thanks, IRS and FBI — with that true enemy of mankind, those despicable American conservatives!)
 




• Le Monde:
Chemical Warfare in Syria
• BHO: Somebody hold me back
or I swear I will do nothing!



 




The West's Limits, by Serguei
• The Europeans:
The red line has been crossed, Obama
• BHO:
I can't manage to cross my own!





Update: SMART DIPLOMACY — Even leftist Joschka Fischer, of all people, grieves about “the loss” of America’s role as the world’s “indispensable nation”: “even inveterate anti-Americans will be crying out in the future for the old global order-maker.”
Related: With all those articles on Syria's WMD, meanwhile, Le Monde is being accused of working in tandem with France's secret services, leading Le Monde ombudsman Pascal Galinier to devote an entire column to the subject. All we can say is that's what happens when you can't stop repeating that believing in Saddam's possession of WMD can only be ridiculous and that George W Bush can be described as nothing less than an outright liar. (Needless to say, our old friend Rémy Ourdan has to step in and repeat the mantra that Saddam's WMD were a lie of Dubya's, while Assad's WMD are plainly and mainfestly nothing of the sort…)

Le Monde appartient-il aux services secrets français ?" En voilà une question ! Cela n'est pas un courrier de lecteur. Pas tout à fait. Cette interrogation en forme d'accusation est le titre d'un courriel en bonne et due forme, envoyé au médiateur le 28 mai, au lendemain des révélations de notre journal sur l'usage de gaz toxiques par le régime syrien. Le dénommé "Do" y cache son identité mais pas ses idées. …

"Do" ne pose de questions que pour mieux asséner ses réponses. Un grand classique du conspirationnisme, phénomène déjà évoqué dans ces colonnes, notamment lors de l'affaire Merah ou des printemps arabes. Une chronique du médiateur fut même titrée "Conspirationnite" (Le Monde daté 16-17 septembre 2012).

Deux autres lecteurs, dans leurs courriels, relaient sans ambages les soupçons véhiculés par un site qui a fait du Monde une de ses cibles favorites, Investig'Action. "De plus en plus de lecteurs, en France comme en Belgique, se demandent à la solde de qui vous travaillez ou par qui vous êtes muselés", affirme le premier, Bernard Van Muy, de Bruxelles. "Le quotidien de référence est devenu le quotidien des mensonges éhontés et de la manipulation otano-qatariote", assène le second, un certain Bruno Drweski...

N'en jetez plus !

Inutile de dire que la confirmation par Laurent Fabius, mardi 4 juin, de l'utilisation de gaz sarin en Syrie, après analyse des échantillons rapportés par nos journalistes, relance la machine à soupçons à notre égard...

Votre médiateur a d'abord hésité entre ironie et cynisme : si même nos contempteurs nous aident à refaire du Monde le bon vieux "journal de référence"... Un peu facile. Et pas si simple. D'autres lecteurs s'interrogent. Dont plusieurs habitués de cette page Dialogues. Ils posent des questions qui méritent des réponses. Que nos amis complotistes ne trouveront évidemment ni sincères, ni convaincantes, ni honnêtes, ni pertinentes - rayer la mention inutile...

"Le travail de journaliste est-il fiable dans la recherche de la preuve militaire ?, se demande le fidèle Igor Deperraz (Bully, Seine-Maritime). Demain, deux journalistes russes pourraient échantillonner sur des populations civiles des pseudo-neurotoxiques de l'autre côté de la barricade..." "Dans un vieux pays démocratique comme le nôtre, l'empathie n'est-elle pas le plus grand danger pour un journaliste professionnel ?", observe Bernard Lart (Nages, Gard). "Le journal Le Monde vient de préparer le terrain pour une initiative française en Syrie, s'inquiète Heinz Mundschau, d'Aix-la-Chapelle (Aachen, Allemagne). Vraie ou pas, l'histoire de ces armes chimiques nous rappelle les fameuses armes de destruction massive de M. Bush junior en Irak..."

"C'est tout le contraire, répond au médiateur Rémy Ourdan, le directeur adjoint des rédactions, qui a supervisé l'opération Syrie. En 2002 et 2003, l'administration Bush ment, invente de fausses "preuves" sur la présence d'armes de destruction massive, et intoxique des médias à New York et Washington, loin du terrain. Là, on est dans le cas inverse : les journalistes vont sur place, rapportent des échantillons qui permettent d'établir la preuve, et les Etats se prononcent ensuite..."

Certes, admet M. Deperraz, mais "si l'on exclut la possible appartenance aux services de renseignements français de ces professionnels de l'info, on ne peut exclure une manipulation politique d'une des parties au conflit. Le journaliste peut témoigner de ce qu'il perçoit, il ne peut se substituer aux organismes de contrôle internationaux pour "échantillonner" un théâtre de guerre. Il y a donc dans cette volonté de porter la preuve au niveau de la responsabilité d'un Etat comme un soupçon de confusion des genres."

Le Monde a précisément pris toutes les précautions pour éviter ce soupçon, rappelait Natalie Nougayrède dans son deuxième éditorial sur le sujet (Le Monde du 6 juin) : "C'est en constatant sur place l'ampleur de l'utilisation de gaz toxiques que nos journalistes ont décidé qu'ils devaient tenter de sortir du pays des échantillons, destinés à être expertisés." Si lesdits échantillons ont été confiés aux autorités françaises, c'est "pour une raison simple : le seul laboratoire en France habilité à établir de manière incontestable la nature des substances transportées dépend de la Délégation générale de l'armement".

"Il y a eu un échange de lettres recommandées avec les autorités françaises, qui se sont engagées à nous remettre les résultats des analyses de nos échantillons, indique Rémy Ourdan. C'est une situation très inhabituelle, mais c'était le seul moyen dont on disposait pour compléter notre travail d'information. Le gouvernement nous a aussi remis les résultats des analyses des autres éléments de preuve qu'il possède, qui confirment l'usage de gaz sarin par les troupes d'Assad."

Pour autant, ajoute-t-il, "le journal ne défend pas un camp, il fait du journalisme. Si nos reporters avaient eu des éléments montrant que des rebelles avaient utilisé des gaz toxiques, ils l'auraient évidemment dit !".

Et maintenant ? "Nous sommes quelques-uns à attendre un reportage symétrique, tout aussi spectaculaire et susceptible de médiatisation : celui qui nous ferait vivre, avec la même empathie, le quotidien des populations restées sous la tutelle des autorités gouvernementales, prévient Alain Coulon (Paris), membre de la Société des lecteurs du Monde. Nous pourrions apprécier leur appétence à vivre dans une Syrie gérée par les différentes factions de l'ASL, l'Armée syrienne libre, sous l'égide des Saoudiens et des Qataris, avec la bénédiction des Occidentaux..."

"I Hate Americans"

The final sentence in what is currently Le Monde's most popular article (according to readers' votes on its website) is actually "I hate them". But no matter. It applies to Americans, and so I extrapolated a bit for this post's title.

Iraqis seem optimistic, as we've already seen, and seem to welcome the transition of sovereignty in joy and harmony. Besides, they seem to think that if they have any enemies, it is the forces of terrorism that launch attacks on them as well as on the coalition forces.

But you wouldn't know that from reading France's newspaper of reference. Le Monde offers their special envoy in Iraq one full page to develop a story on Iraqis, and the article Rémy Ourdan pens concerns a couple of Iraqis who… hate the United States.

And, to be quite honest, they have reason to. They were prisoners — innocent as it turns out — in Abu Ghraib and elsewhere, and they do not have fond memories of their jailers, to say the least. Ourdan doesn't even need to flex his writing muscles. The entire page is composed by the men's quotes. And here, of course, is where the problems start. There does not seem to have been any fact-checkers set out to corroborate the men's testimony, and no effort to get differing opinions and quotes from other sources. (But that, of course, is forgetting that when capitalist America is involved, any attack is good and welcome.)

Still (that is, in spite of the fact I find hard to believe some of their "testimony" concerning things they did not directly experience, such as a soldier lobbing a grenade into his cousins' mother's house for no apparent reason), I see no reason to go out of my way to put the gist their testimony concerning their own detention into doubt.

The last sentence is devastatingly strong — "I hate them" (the Americans) — and the idea retained is that the bulk of Americans in Iraq is hated by the bulk of Iraqis in Iraq (which, if true, would tend to corrobrate the Gallic thought that France has been right from the beginning and that the Iraqis ought to be grateful for Paris's position and stand by the side of their true protector and benefactor) — which probably helps to explain why the article found itself at the very top of the items recommended by Monde.fr readers.

The article's title seems just as devastating and to paint a picture just as generally harmful to good relations : American Torture, Iraqi Testimony. But as far as testimony goes, when I mentioned "a couple" of Iraqis earlier, I meant that literally; the quotes in the entire article come from just that: two Iraqi men. Sure, the pair were innocent, sure, they suffered, and no doubt they deserve compensation. Still, this was the exception rather than the rule. The exact opposite of the previous state of affairs (under Saddam, that is). But that is something Le Monde will not, will never, explain to its readers.

As far as Guerre contre le terrorisme et droit humanitaire, is concerned, there is not a single article in that special Monde section (to download) on the real torture in Iraq, that practiced by Saddam Hussein for three decades. You know, the severed hands, the faces doused in acid, the meat from wives' arms given to their husbands to eat, etc, not to mention the mass graves throughout the land… (It's probably a safe bet that the newspaper of reference never made any special sections on human rights in Iraq during Saddam's reign.)

So, since Le Monde doesn't present other views to its readers (in spite of the homily that all opinions ought to be represented), I will do it for them. Here are some Iraqis who are hardly ready to believe that the prisoners deserve pity or that they are even innocent or that the Americans (jailers and other) are dirty rotten scoundrels, the true bad guys in the whole Iraqi mess.

But since one of them (an M.D. at Abu Ghraib) showed more discernment than Ourdan — he said "Some of [the prisoners] say they are [innocent] and others boast in front of me, … telling the crimes they committed in details. Of course I’m not naive enough to blindly believe either" — and since they are not the type of Iraqis who would say "I hate Americans", do not expect them to get much room in France's media.

Update: Whereas you have heard about the outrage of the Arab street, Iraq the Model gives us a quite informative piece on Iraqi reactions to the Abu Ghraib torture scandal. Sample (Please notice that the question directed at the Arab media below can also be directed at the French media and other publications on the European continent and, indeed, in the United States):

I think that the event took more space than it actually deserves and the media are creating a mountain from a grain. It's enough for us to remember Saddam's doings to comment on what recently happened"; "I think that those criminals who were responsible for the mass graves in my country (who are now in your jails' cells) should apologize for their massacres against the Iraqi people"; "I'd like to direct my question to the Arabic media 'where were you when Saddam mass-executed my people and used all kinds of torture against us?'"; "I think that our Arab brothers should mind their own business and take a look at their own prisons."

sundry

Sorry for the lack of posts recently. I've been flat out. To make up for it, here's a few briefs on things I've been meaning to mention.

A:	Our friend Rémy Ourdan participated in an on-line chat with lemonde.fr readers on Wednesday. Sarah: Since you're on the scene, can you clearly tell us what the feelings of the population are about the military operations and other attacks organized against the occupation forces? How does the Iraqi in the street see these operations: acts of resistance or terrorism? Remy Ourdan: For the Iraqis, these are both at once. Many publicly applaud the attacks on the American army because this army is seen as brutal and arrogant. But the same people describe all attacks that target Iraqis as terrorism. Moreover, let's reiterate that the occupation army is very unpopular but that many Iraqis privately admit that they don't want its immediate departure, out of fear, even now, of civil war. Later, he had this exchange: Richard 75: It seems that Iraqis (even when they are anti-American) have a virulent anti-French feeling because they think that France tried to save Saddam. Can you confirm or deny this? Remy Ourdan: This feeling is very strong in Iraq. Almost all the Shia, almost all the Kurds and many Sunnis think that France defended Saddam Hussein to protect an old friendship and so-called economic and petrol interests. Also, many Iraqis are angry with France because of its attitude after the war. Pragmatic, they feel that once the conflict was over and Saddam gone, France and the other countries of Europe should have come to their aid for humanitarian reasons and, again, not to leave them alone to face the Americans.
ß	A mere two years after the BBC, that cutting edge culture journal, did it, lemonde.fr helped its readers stay hip on Tuesday by informing them of the Google Bomb phenomenon. They point to the WMD and miserable failure pranks but they forget — or are too clueless to be aware — that they are themselves the victims of such a prank.
Γ	Having found a distributor, Mel Gibson's Passion of the Qrap opens on more than 520 screens in France next Wednesday where, though it contains perhaps a little bit of violence, it will only be forbidden to children under 12. The AFP is reporting that three Jewish brothers, the Benlolos, who have not seen the film, went to court to-day, seeking to have the movie banned. Patrick Benlolo called the film an "incitation to racial hatred because it is the result of an erroneous presentation of the bible, portraying Jews as deicides, which is the cause of the Jews' persecutions." Olivier Laude, the lawyer representing distributor Quinta Communications claims the Benlolos' complaint should be dismissed because it seeks redress for potential violence, which only criminal authorities can prosecute, though it seems that the movie has already provoked its fair share of violence elsewhere. [3/28: In the comments below, a reader points out that in fact the film prompted the murderer to confess, not to kill — which I'd have noticed if I'd bothered to read the articled linked here. ¡No Pasarán! regrets the error.] Meanwhile, Marin Karmitz, head of the MK2 movieplex chain, has refused to screen the film, calling it "fascist." His interview with Télérama provoked a flurry of hate mail but also approbation. In particular, he said: It's a film that turns barbarism and violence into a spectacle. For two hours, we see a man being tortured, nothing more. Second fascistic element: revisionism, the way in which History is charicatured, reduced to aphasia for the sole benefit of noises, blows and cries. To deny Christianity its words it to deny its greatness. At last, given the depiction of the Jews, anti-Semitism is the third element of this fascist ideology. But, in America, the Jewish lobbies have led themselves astray by putting the debate in this framework only: they have unwittingly fed the far right attack of which this film is evidence. Paris Archbishop, Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger, who was born Jewish but converted, has decried the film's "sadism." He told the Catholic TV station KTO that "the Gospels are neither the Gallic Wars nor Napoleon's memoirs." The love of God "is not measured in liters of hemoglobin and spilled blood," he said. "For us, Christ's blood is in the chalice during the liturgy." (The film meeting with great success in Lebanon: "the fact that the film is being shown in the current context of the Middle East conflict, opposing Israel and Arabs, is not unrelated to the success of the film," said one spectator.) Lustiger, you'll remembe, is the one who criticized Abbé Pierre for endorsing the Holocaust denier Roger Garaudy
Δ	Spanish writer Juan Goytisolo has an essay in Thursday's Le Monde entitled "Return to Reason." While the war in Afghanistan, decided on both in the framework of international law and out of the pressing need to end the obscurantist Taliban regime that acted as a refuge for bin Laden and his organization, partially attained its goals (partially, because the number one terrorist and one of his closest followers still move about freely), the Invasion of Iraq to put an end to the alleged threat of Saddam Hussein has been (with the not negligible exception of the latter's arrest and the dismantling of his regime) a total absurdity. [...] The phraseology of the current occupant of the White House regarding "international terrorism" has nevertheless had an immediate effect, both in the East and the West, in the European Union and in Russia. Sharon has seized on it to crush the Palestinians and pen them in ghettos encircled by a wall even more bloody than the one erected in Berlin a half century ago. Had enough? You may remember that, like Russell Banks and Oliver Stone, Goytisolo is a member of the International Parliament of Writers who visited Yasser Arafat in 2002. While there, one member, Nobelist José Saramago, told reporters that "What is happening in Palestine is a crime which we can put on the same plane as what happened at Auschwitz, at Buchenwald," adding that "There are no gas chambers yet. But that does not mean there will never be gas chambers . . . one can kill without having gas chambers." Following these remarks, Saramago was denounced by other IPW members. However, philosopher Alain Finkielkraut also reported the IPW subsequently "appealed to the director of France Culture to rescind the invitation extended to [then Israeli ambassador to France] Elie Barnavi, the representative of a “terrorist, neo-fascist and nazi” government, to a radio program which they were also to attend. Laure Adler didn’t give in so Juan Goytisolo refused to sit at the same table as the ambassador."
Ε	Le Nouvel Observateur has posted its cover story from March 25, 1974: "Can we do without the Americans?" ...of the thirteen divisions that the American army currently comprises, four (a third!) are in Europe. Of the 2,250,000 men in the the US Armed forces, all services combined, including the Marines, 313,000 are supposed to defend us. There are 228,000 of them in West Germany, 3,000 in Greece, 2,000 in Holland, 3,000 in Iceland, 10,000 in Italy, 1,000 in Morocco, 2,000 in Portugal, 7,000 in Turkey, 23,000 in the Sixth Fleet and 2,000 roving. [...] If one considers, in addition to this spearhead, the deployment of the 8,000 nuclear warheads located somewhere in Germany, one can form a rather precise impression of the great atomic umbrella that the United States — for the modest sum of $7 million a year — graciously extend over European heads that are grateful or that should be...

Smoke gets in your eyes

Rémy Ourdan continues his passage through Baghdad's wistful thinking classes with this report on an aging, chronically depressed Baghdadi pianist who's now planning to emigrate to the US. Samir Peter plays Gershwin for Americans and Brel for the French. He is currently being followed around by BBC documentary filmmaker Sean McAllister. Peter is also old enough to remember the glittering 1960s Baghdad under president Abd al-Salam Aref (1963-1968): "It was fabulous. There were cabarets. The Moulin rouge, The Embassy. Some staged revues from Paris and Las Vegas with their splendid nude dancers. Baghdadi couples went to see them. You could invite your fiancée. When I see Baghdad to-day, these ignorant types and veiled girls..."

Though he may be melancholy and particularly unhappy with the present state of Iraq, Peter says he is "delighted" with the fall of Saddam which is the "most important part" of this American episode. Ourdan reproduces generous portions of Peter's statements about Saddam:

This man was the nightmare of an entire people. He insulted, raped and martyred our country. He killed. He rewrote history. He tried to teach us to love war. He taught our children to hate others and to hate art. He taught them to live only by his so-called "values," those of a pathetic dope and a criminal. ... Saddam became president of Iraq by killing all his friends and then he immediately launched a war. This man worshiped the idea of war. You could read the joy and excitement in his eyes when he brandished a rifle. I was able to avoid the call-up for a long time because I taught at the music school. But, one morning, when I was returning from a party, still drunk, three men knocked on my door. They took me away and forced me to sign a document stating that I was a "volunteer" to fight Iran. After two weeks of training at shooting a Kalashnikov, I found myself on the front, in a trench near Basra.

"We were board stiff in the trenches. So I spent my time sharpening a hunting knife that I'd brought with me, a knife that over the days became sharper than a razor. One night, I was on guard duty. I was thinking about my lot, me, the music professor, the resident pianist for the Sheraton hotel chain, who now found himself in the mud. I was sad. I fell asleep. I had a dream, a nightmare, in which Jesus came toward me. I woke with a start. The moon was shining. I saw some Iranians who must have snuck in through the no man's land while I was asleep, at the end of the trench. I wanted to grab my rifle but it had disappeared in the mud. I grabbed my knife and stood facing them, shouting like a madman. One of them ran off. The other jumped on me. We fought. I ended up finding his throat. I slit it. His blood squirted out on my face. Then he agonized, coughing with a hoarse breath.

Ourdan writes: "Samir is haunted by the face of this Iranian fighter, 'a handsome youth, with a well-trimmed beard.' He will never forgive Saddam Hussein for having made him into a man capable of killing another, even if during an honorable battle. 'I was demobilized soon afterward. A bullet had hit me in the face. And I've been trying to leave Iraq ever since I got back.'" But Peter's luck has been rotten.

I was supposed to get my first American visa in 1990: Saddam invaded Kuwait. Then, two of my daughters married Americans of Iraqi origin in Jordan but, every time I planned to leave, there was a problem. Their mother, my ex-wife, went to live in the United States, but not me. After each marriage, I was interrogated by the secret police when I returned to Baghdad. Why were my daughters marrying Americans? Was I a CIA spy? I was supposed to get my second American visa in 2001: I arrived at the American embassy in Jordan the day after September 11. All the visas were canceled: thanks, bin Laden. That time, I was detained and tortured for 12 days when I got back to Baghdad...

Since he couldn't get out, Peter lived through the two American wars.

I was terrified, especially during the first war. I'll always remember the first night. The planes arrived. I can still hear the sound of these planes. I was very scared but I didn't want my wife to know. And then, boom! The bombs. My wife, who is very pious, prayed the whole night. But I sat on the bed and drank and drank and drank. During the weeks of the American bombing, I think I drank at least 200 bottles of whisky and wine... Then, during the last war, I switched to Valium and whisky, too. The worst part was the ground war, the entrance of the American army into Baghdad. The tanks came, the machine gunners shot up houses, cars, passersby. I was surprised, while taking a bath, by a shell that fell on the roof of my house. There was shooting everywhere. I stayed lying on the bathroom floor for seven hours, naked, wrapped in a towel. I really thought my heart might give out... At last, I rejoiced: it was the end of Saddam. The end of Saddam!

In a few days, Peter is to receive one of his daughters and his American grandchildren who have never seen the land of their origins. Peter is overjoyed that they are coming but worries about leaving behind two other children, a son and a daughter who plan to join him in San Diego.

Their arrival worries me. Right now, Baghdad is only violence, kidnapping and banditry. I tried to dissuade them from making this trip but my daughter wants her children to see Iraq at least once in their lives. ... How is America? Do you think a 55 year-old Iraqi pianist has any chance of finding work? Of success? ... I gave the scores for all these ballads to the women I wrote them for but I think I remember almost all of them. Maybe I could record an album? Or a Jazz album? Or be an actor in Hollywood?

Peter had two names at the music school, "the skirt chaser," given him by the ballet teacher, and "Tom Cruise," because of the tinted aviator sunglasses that he's never without. Ourdan writes:

In the evenings, Samir Peter often disappears into a long silence. An abyss of silence. Who or what is he thinking of? Of Saddam, the Iranian soldier, of the women loved and lost? Of this moth-eaten corner cubbyhole that the al-Hamra hotel gives him and where he spends his cavernous nights? He says simply, with a very solemn air, that he's doing "very, very badly."

Then, a pretty foreign women appears at the corner of the stair case. So his eye perks up. Then, a glass of wine in his hand, a cigarette stuck between his lips, he gets back behind his piano. He plays. He sings. "Because of you... there's a song in my heart...." A song in his heart, Samir forgets everything. He forgets Saddam and the Iranian soldier. He forgets the past and the future, when he has a piano and a woman.

I Stand By My Story…

A couple of readers have pointed out that one exhibit in Perpignan will be including photos from the killing fields of Iraq. They make it sound like there will be just as many photos on this as on Abu Ghraib and like they will be similarly treated. So was I wrong to write that the Visa pour l'image photojournalism festival will not be showing photos of Saddam Hussein's crimes?

Technically, perhaps, it would seem that way at first. But after examining the evidence…

…I stand by my story.

And how!

Let me explain why.

Ever so often we get comments from irate readers, challenging our contention that what drives government policy in France amounts, at last partly, to (rabid?) anti-Americanism, and that the French are actually quite reasonable and willing to be self-critical. This they accompany by specific examples. Meanwhile, all sorts of people and the French media will claim that they are objective and that the lucid people they are do give all the viewpoints.

Indeed, in Le Monde, you will on occasion find columns and letters to the editor castigating France's Iraq policy while praising Bush's, or articles with content that supports the case for war against Saddam Hussein.

However, I call these token articles and token letters to the editor (here an example from Germany). As I have written elsewhere, they appear far and few between, and I have given my opinion that a ballpark figure of how often they would appear would be less than 5% of the time (and print space).

Their main purpose is not to get an intellectual discussion of any sort going, but to serve as a piece of evidence for the powers-that-be (both to others and to themselves) that they (the latter) have been fair, that they are reasonable, and that they are objective. Following that, they will not weigh the evidence or hold a meaningful discussion, but return to the usual Bush-bashing, the traditional America-mocking, and the typical expression of disgust over the latest capitalist outrage.

If you will bear with me while I briefly discuss two examples, I will get back to the issue at hand. The two examples happen to be extremely meaningful.

In the first, Rémy Ourdan introduces his Le Monde article, entitled France's position remains highly criticized by the Iraqis, with these words: "It is almost impossible, except among unseated Ba'athist officials, to find anybody who supports Paris's position in the crisis. France's policy remains highly criticized by Iraqis. Contrary to what Europeans often think, the fact of being opposed to the American occupation in no way heightens the popularity of Europe or one or another country in Iraq"…

The second example is Mouna Naïm's Le Monde article entitled The Issue of Iraq's Weaponry Is Not Clear-Cut: In the review Politique Étrangère, five experts keep the debate on the existence of WMD alive.

As I have written elsewhere, the first article basically undermines, undoes, and shatters the whole peace camp logic in favor of continued peace and dialog with Saddam Hussein (at least with regards to this position favoring — and being favored by — Iraqis); while the second undermines, undoes, and shatters the entire controversy that has been damaging George W Bush and Tony Blair with regards to their alleged lies when they mentioned the dictator's weapons of mass destruction as a reason for launching the attack on the Iraq.

However, in the first case, the article's content was mentioned just that one time — and then it was back to speaking of the humanists' great protection against the scourge of war, the growing insecurity, and Iraqis' resentment against the Yanks; and in the second, the article was hidden in a media review on one of the back pages — and then it was back to carping about the lies of the Bush camp.

So Ted Welch is right: I find this an injustice worthy of fighting against, bravely or otherwise.

Now, back to Perpignan. Just as I consider those rare pro-US articles and letters to be tokens, which are not taken into account for any other reason than to heap praise upon oneself (as objective, wise, tolerant, etc etc, etc), I consider the (few) photos in the exhibit to be tokens that serve as a smokescreen to hide Europe's anti-Americanism.

As it happens, the evidence bears me out.

Were the photos of killing fields to be as numerous and to be displayed as prominently as those of the Abu Ghraib snapshots, I would have been forced to recant. Had both groups of pictures been displayed with (hardly) any comments — just like they were on ¡No Pasarán! — I would have been forced to recant. (And to apologize.) And I would have done so.

But check the evidence:

First of all, look at the URL page of the "official festive announcement": When I first came upon it, I was moved by all those pictures of Saddam's victims, especially that stomach-churning (black and white) picture of the man cut in two at the waist — until I saw it was a picture of a Hollywood prop! Then the cell picture of the bizarre Asian-looking "Iraqis" at the top of the page made sense; it was for a story on "the alarming mental health crisis" from China to Pakistan. Even the Muslim woman behind a (prison?) fence has nothing to do with Iraq. As it happens, both the text and the photo of the killing field are in the least important place, at the bottom of the page (the text at the bottom of the first column, the photo at that of the second column).

This ties in with the expression the festival's director uses for the Abu Ghraib snapshots. The "most important pictures of the year" (as Ray D points out) concerns not the graves of hundreds of thousands killed by a dictator (some for as little as laughing about a joke of Saddam Hussein), but a couple of dozen prisoners (maybe many more, I'm willing to grant you that) forced to pose for sophomoric pictures.

Third, and more importantly, read the text of the website (followed by its logical translation):

• 'Why Mister, why?' (the pleas of an innocent before the treacherous war-mongering Yanks)
• the year America occupied Iraq (Gratuitiously, and without any reason whatsoever, Americans submitted the entire Iraqi population to a humiliating and unnecessary occupation, there having been nothing in the country beforehand to merit anything other than national satisfaction and general contentment)
• The situation in Iraq following the declaration of 'mission accomplished' represented a culture clash of rare proportions (Washington was/Americans are dumb and short-sighted, certainly not as world-wise as (say) the French)
• Geert van Kesteren was witness to what went wrong (A world-wise European hits it on the nail)
• He saw clouds of sadness coming from the mass graves created by the Saddam regime (as Ray D points out, "The focus is not on Saddam's regime or its atrocities. They simply say in one line that the Saddam regime "created" the graves… (gee I wonder how that happened). It is really more about describing sadness since the "arrogant occupying" power came to town.")
• …and Shi'ites enjoying their awakening freedom (for God's sake, do not even think of writing who got them that freedom in the first place [see more about US troops two lines down])
• He saw the occupying force of an arrogant world power (just like all lucid, world-wise beings [mainly Europeans] do)
• Embedded with US troops, he witnessed disgraceful raids on Iraqi citizens (nothing about US troops awakening the Iraqis' freedom here and nothing about the disgraceful raids of a dictator's police forces forcing themselves into houses to remove Iraqis to the jails and torture chambers [the real ones] of Saddam Hussein [more on this below])
• Citizens had hoped for a better, non-violent, future, but their hopes were dashed (Like all the wise, inherently peace-loving members of our world community, every single Iraqi wanted/wants only cooperation and understanding and love and peace and freedom, but, as usual, those dastardly violent beings, the treacherous American war-lover party, blew out that flame of hope)
• In a clear photojournalistic way… (with the inherent wisdom and lucidity of European humanitarians…)
• …Geert van Kesteren outlines why it will take a long time before the Iraqi people can enjoy a semblance of peace (a humanistic European clearly knows where to place the blame of Iraq's sorry state, i.e., on the American presence, natch)

In other words, the "most important pictures of the year" exhibit is here to heap criticism on Americans, and what some readers suggest is an exhibit on Saddam's mass graves — but which is really called the Geert van Kesteren / Focus / Cosmos exhibit and which will evidently include far more pictures castigating U.S. troops — will also heap criticism on Americans.

This, we must suppose, is what the French call "ouvrir le débat" (an oft-used phrase meaning "a serious debate must be opened"), with supposedly all viewpoints considered…

So, this exhibit I consider the same as the token letters and articles: a smokescreen.

Once one's conscience has been cleared, thanks to having let someone "with a narrow viewpoint" speak (briefly) his mind, then one can get back to the real dangers in everyday life — castigating and blaming America.

And needless to say, I won't even start going into the fact that the country's media have been talking exclusively about the Abu Ghraib snapshots (but then, there's hardly anything unusual abut that, is there now?).

So there you have it: I find this an injustice worthy of fighting against, bravely or otherwise.

Before I close, I would like to remind you again of the first token article we discussed at the opening of this post. The journalist made an amazing proposition: he actually asked those who are first and foremost concerned by the fall of Saddam Hussein and the presence of foreign soldiers in their country — i.e., the Iraqis themselves — how they felt about the war and its aftermath.

Now I would like you to ask you to take another look at the photo of the father bestowing a final kiss on the dried skull of his son. (It should not escape notice that the place this skeleton was dug up at was the burial grounds of… Abu Ghraib.)

Which pictures do you think Ghirayer Ali would deem "the most important photos of the year", Monsieur Leroy? Those showing some of hundreds of thousands of murdered Iraqi civilians dug up from the Iraqi sands, including his son at Abu Ghraib, or the snapshots documenting US troops humiliating prisoners (a good portion of which were those who murdered their countrymen in the first place)?

Before I'm accused of catering to base emotionalism, I will take back the question, and ask a more general one: which of the two groups of pictures do you think your average Iraqi would deem "the most important photos of the year", Monsieur Leroy?

You don't know it, Monsieur Leroy, but the answer (or I should say: because the answer) lies in the Rémy Ourdan article that most readers have already forgotten.

An Iraqi living in Germany adds the following on David's Medienkritik:

I often find people asking me: Was Saddam that evil ? -No, he was as evil that fantasy can't imagine. Well, this question is out of the frame because everyone knows this who just took a glimpse of Saddam's Iraq.

I can count some books about Modern Iraq which aren't translated into German because all translators are busy with Michael Moore new books and the audience doesn't want it.

Maybe the covering up of the US Press is not systemtatic or so, but until the trial of Saddam there will be no final view on Saddam's Iraq. The German Press is busy with covering up the "resistance" which is by all odds just a minority of the Iraqi people, while the majority was victim of the practices of torture and so on.

I've got a relative in Baghdad telling me that every five minutes you see in Iraq an amputed man who lost his limbs either by war or torture or by other causes. I told him they are rarely seen on T.V. here. So the press ignores that masses of disabled persons for searching al-Jazeera-like masked, coward men with a Ak-47 telling what the audience likes to hear.

Maybe the German Press took the glasses filtering all colours of the World except Blue, White and Red, so they can watch out for Americans !

Samir adds that one of the writers, who claimed that the Geert van Kesteren exhibit shows that Europeans are exceedingly fair and objective, ignored the hyperlinks he had recommended a few days earlier. (Semir finds this unjust, and so do I.)

The Iraqi Holocaust is a clearing house for information on atrocities under the Iraqi dictator and the Ba'ath party.

Iraq Center is the documental center for human rights in Iraq. Besides truly horrifying photos, it shows drawings of the forms of torture used by Saddam's thugs, a quite different form of treatment than that given at Abu Ghraib. Samir issues a warning: the pictures are horrible!

You can see more pictures if you replace the last number "1", for first picture, with "2", "3", etc, e.g. http://iraqcenter.com/bedaye/halat/archive_7/2.jpg

There are 15 pictures of torture methods available. Most of them are unknown to the German public.

And no wonder. The German media — and the French media — see no need to make anything (beyond a few token texts or photo displays) of viewpoints and pictures that undermine the peace camp's position or that supports Bush's decision to go to war.

So Ted Welch is right: I find this an injustice worthy of fighting against, bravely or otherwise.

I stand by my story.

UPDATE: The best way to find out, I figured, was to go see with my own eyes. So I filled 'er up, got behind the wheel, and drove to Perpignan. There I walked around the city, visiting the various places set up to welcome the best news photos of the year. To make a long story short, my worst suspicions — and what I wrote in this column — were confirmed…

The Latin American Lady Who Refuses to Drink Coca-Cola

One weekend in Paris last summer, I went out for dinner and dance at le Bataclan, a trendy Brazilian place. With me was a French dude and two Latin American girls.

• Everyday Meetings with Common Europeans (and a couple of Latin American senhoritas)

After ordering our meals, we told the waitress what we wished to drink. As she left, one of the girls leaned forward:

Do you drink Coca-Cola?

"Ah… yes", I said slowly, my bemused and inquisitive voice trailing off…

I refuse to drink Coca-Cola.

I knew what was coming.

I don't like it when nations invade others.

Rather innocently, I replied:

Oh, but the Iraqis liked it when America invaded Iraq.

This took her aback. In an incredulous tone of voice, she asked

The Iraqis like war?!

I wouldn't say they exactly like war, or the present situation, but it is a vast improvement on what the country used to be like.

Because I hear so many doubts and cynicism about the average Iraqi's point of view — due to the MSM's usage of emotionally-charged words of the superlative kind, such as les massacres, le chaos, and l'horreur (and la misère as a description of America's capitalistic society in general), it is practically impossible to touch on positive aspects of the United States (and certainly the presence of its troops in Iraq) in the country of le débat et le dialogue, without being treated to snickers, snorts, harrumphs, and eye-rolling — I have taken to carry a handful of copies of the Le Monde piece (unfortunately, a token article), in which its Baghdad correspondant, instead of relying on his media's usual emotionally-charged words, went around instead and questioned Iraqi citizens.

Not only did Rémy Ourdan report that the pretty much unanimous response to the invasion was that it was the best thing to happen to Iraq in the past 30 years, but Iraqi voices just as overwhelmingly heaped scorn upon the French position concerning their opposition to the American decision to invade (indirectly castigating the position of all "peace camp" members, the position of Bush's opponents, the film of Michael Moore, etc, etc, etc), in the process casting doubt on the true intentions of Paris (doubts of a kind usually reserved for Dubya in the West).

When faced with cynics (as regular visitors to this website know), I don't even bother arguring with them anymore. Instead of wasting my time, I just fish out a photocopy of Ourdan's article and hand it to them.

That's what I now proceeded to do. After going over the title (La politique de la France reste très vivement critiquée par les Irakiens), I pointed out various Iraqi quotes. "Well", the lady finally said in a determined tone of voice:

If I were an Iraqi woman, I would not like it [the foreign invasion]

Well, querida, I told her, you would definitely be in a tight minority if you felt that way, and there wouldn't exactly be a lot of admiration from your (Iraqi) sisters if you said so in a boastful tone of voice.

At this point, her friend chimed in:

Ah, c'm'on, let's talk about something else. Politics should not be discussed during dinner.

I agreed totally, but, hey, then again I didn't bring the subject up, did I? None of them could help it, I guess, that they were with a guy who, after 911, made a solemn promise (and I don't care how arrogant that might sound) that he would never let someone get away with cheap anti-Americanism without reacting.

Besides, if her initial comment had led to a general Bush-bashing fest, I doubt anybody would have complained. I often feel that such comments ("let's not talk politics") only arise when the conversation doesn't seem to be going their way.

In any case the subject was changed, and a wonderful time was had by all. As the senhorita was leaving, however, I asked her,

Didn't you forget something?

"Here, take this", I said as I handed her one of my copies of the Le Monde article. "Read it when you have the time."

She promised whe would.

(But I don't know if she has taken to drinking Coca-Cola again…)

• Read more Everyday Meetings with Common Europeans

The Flight Attendant Who Doesn't Like Violence

Saturday, I spoke to a French flight attendant.

• Everyday Meetings with Common Europeans

Quickly, the discussion turned to traveling, and then to America. Within a couple of seconds, she had to let the following slip in:

Ah, j'adore l'Amérique, mais pas leur président.

"Oh really", I asked disarmingly. "But the Iraqis, they like le président americain." Dubious look:

Ah ça j'en doute, avec tous leurs massacres!

Because I hear so many doubts and cynicism about the average Iraqi's point of view — due to the MSM press's usage of emotionally-charged words of the superlative kind, such as les massacres, le chaos, and l'horreur (and la misère as a description of America's capitalistic society in general), it is practically impossible to touch on positive aspects of the United States (and certainly on the presence of its troops in Iraq) in the country of le débat et le dialogue, without being treated to snickers, snorts, harrumphs, and eye-rolling — I have taken to carry a handful of copies of the Le Monde piece (unfortunately, a token article) in which its Baghdad correspondant, instead of relying on his media's usual emotionally-charged words, went around instead and questioned Iraqi citizens.

In his unguarded moment, not only did Rémy Ourdan report that the pretty much unanimous response to the invasion was that it was the best thing to happen to Iraq in the past 30 years, but Iraqi voices just as overwhelmingly heaped scorn upon the French position concerning their opposition to the American decision to invade (indirectly castigating the position of all "peace camp" members, the position of Bush's opponents, the film of Michael Moore, etc, etc, etc), in the process casting doubt on the true intentions of Paris (doubts of a kind usually reserved for Dubya).

When faced with cynics, I don't even bother arguing with them anymore. Instead of wasting my time, I just fish out a photocopy of Ourdan's article and hand it to them.

That's what I did Saturday with my flight attendant. Reading the title (La politique de la France reste très vivement critiquée par les Irakiens), she immediately said:

Oui, mais il y a d'autres opinions.

There may be other opinions, I replied, but there don't seem to be too many of them. "Presque impossible", I would say that's 95% of the general consensus, or above…

She looked it over quickly, saying

Yes, but it was a war for oil.

I asked, "Wasn't the position of the Saddam supporters equally based on oil?"

Hein? she went.

The people who were against the war, didn't they do it for Iraq's oil? And what's worse, for the oil of a dictator.

Suddenly the flight attendant said she had to go.

But take the article with you, I invited.

Ah non, je ne veux rien lire sur la violence.

She doesn't want to read anything about violence, she claimed, but

1. the article is/was not about violence,
2. she was the one who brought up the (general) subject, and (ergo:)
3. apparently, violence as a subject is fine as long as it can be used to bash Bush and America and as long as it cannot, in any way, be turned against France and other humanist members of "the peace camp".

And I have not even started to address the fact that for the generous, tolerant, visionary, solidaristic bon vivants (for whom le débat et le dialogue is a matter of faith), the point of view of the Iraqis themselves — unless it happens to match that of France — does not seem to matter much…

The Proper Perspective

Over at LOTF, I posted a translation of the latest Baghdad dispatch from Le Monde's Rémy Ourdan. You'll remember the astonishment that accompanied another of his recent articles.

I get the feeling Ourdan may be undergoing something of a transformation. This article is even less equivocal in transcribing Baghdadi feelings about the fall of Saddam. And given the current strife, it makes for a somewhat nourishing read:

"When I look at all these faces in my photographs after I've got home, I realize that something has changed..." He looks around the room, all the men sitting on benches, discussing, complaining, laughing.

"The difference is joy," says Nahid. "Before the faces were closed and sad ; today they are open and joyous." The funniest part is that even those who can't stop cursing and predicting a "catastrophe," those who say "it was better before," reveal in Najid's photos a shining face that they did not show a year ago.

"Every Friday, it's a shouting match. Conversations among friends are at once greater and more difficult than before. We've lost our only common ground: life under the dictatorship," says Zuher Radwan. A political analyst and literary critic of Palestinian origin, Zuher, though an Arab nationalist opposed to the United States, admitted in 2003 that he wanted war. "I was right," he said. "The change is wonderful. It was well worth a war..." And Zuher repeats the argument of all his fellow Iraqis who favored the American intervention. "Alone, the Iraqis would never have been able to topple Saddam Hussein."

This makes me think of reconsidering my post below on having the jitters. If a Palestinian pan-Arabist in Baghdad finds it so easy to be optimistic, even in this climate, should I lose heart so soon?

smackdown

My translation of a painful report in Le Monde is up over at Watch:

"While the American leadership is compounding error upon error in Iraq, the Europeans and the French in particular are even stupider because they determine their stance only in reaction to Washington. They do not take Iraq and its inhabitants into account at all," says Fakhri Kareem, editor-in-chief of the newspaper al-Mada, trying to sum up popular sentiment. "Iraqis think France doubly betrayed them, first with Saddam, then with the American occupation. France cares only about its anti-American position. It is forgetting the Iraqis. Chirac and de Villepin must understand that no Iraqi finds their position courageous... What did France do to help Iraq free itself from the dictator and then to help Iraq regain its sovereignty? Nothing!"

As Mårten notes in his presentation, I found this originally through an essay by the intrepid Erik Svane, who points out that appears opposite an interview with the FM, "Dominique 'Who is a Man' Villepin™," as he's called these days. Writes Svane, "what's extraordinary is that the article by Rémy Ourdan completely contradicts (though one can feel that the reporter wrote this article grudgingly) the cartoon by Plantu and also the editorial line of the paper of record and of the French media, and that of the French government."

Two other noteworthy things: Mårten also points out that I wrote to him in an email that "even though it appeared in today's print edition, they've already taken the link to the story off their Web site and I can't find a direct link through the usual means." Svane doesn't link to the story either so I'm assuming he couldn't find it either but found it in the print edition. The only link I can find is to the archived version meaning that, on the date of its publication, it couldn't be found on Le Monde's Web site. If it weren't for Svane, I never would have seen it. How many other politically inconvenient articles have I missed this way? Le Monde does this on occasion: an internet chat with filmmaker Sa'ad Salman (which derided France and Europe's position on Iraq in violent terms) was quickly pulled after it first appeared and replaced with another, more ideologically acceptable one. Salman laughed about this when I interviewed him last summer. (See him talking on French TV: dialup/broadband).

Secondly, Svane observes that Ourdan was one of the French reporters fingered by whistle-blower Alain Hertoghe in his book for having written on more than one occasion that the taking of Baghdad would be a "21st Century Stalingrad." Hertoghe writes that some French journalists seemed ready "to fight to the last Baghdadi."

ALSO: See this little article over at LOTF.

France is Al Qaeda's Nr 2 Target

In an interview with Le Monde's Yves Bordenave and Rémy Ourdan, the top honcho of France's intelligence agency (la Direction Centrale du Renseignement Intérieur or DCRI, known as an "FBI à la française") confirms that, after the United States, "France is Al Qaeda's number 2 target."

Bernard Squarcini's remarks tend to somewhat dilute the self-serving world view during the Bush years that France would not by worried by Islamist attacks (contrary to American airlines, it was smugly intoned, companies like Air France would never be targeted), thanks to Jacques Chirac's "heroic" opposition to Dubya's war against Saddam Hussein and to the attendant popularity with Arab and Muslim populations that would inexorably ensue for France…

…la menace principale pour la France est Al-Qaida au Maghreb islamique [AQMI]. Il y a une proximité géographique, une histoire coloniale passée, et il y a ces allées et venues et ces liens familiaux entre des gens en France et d'autres dans les pays du Maghreb et du Sahel. Il y a aussi une progression qualitative d'AQMI, et la France est en tête des pays menacés.

Ça se confirme avec la tentative d'attentat contre notre ambassade à Nouakchott [Mauritanie] : 1,7 tonne d'explosifs. Manifestement, ils ont un peu la haine. Depuis qu'elle a fait allégeance à Al-Qaida, AQMI a décuplé ses activités. …

S'il n'y a pas d'éléments nouveaux [de nouvelles menaces spécifiques contre la France], pourquoi le ministre de l'intérieur, Claude Guéant, a-t-il déclaré que la France "craint des représailles" ?

Depuis un moment, les communiqués de Ben Laden, de Zawahiri et d'AQMI nous ciblent de plus en plus. On le prend en compte. Les Américains sont la cible n° 1 et la France la cible n° 2 d'Al-Qaida.

A Bush Admirer, Sarkozy Told W About His Coming Presidential Candidacy 16 Months Prior to His Formal Announcement

L'homme fascine les Américains autant qu'il leur raconte être fasciné par l'Amérique

writes Rémy Ourdan about WikiLeaks' Sarkozy revelations in Le Monde.

Il est le "président le plus pro-américain depuis la seconde guerre mondiale". … On découvre dans ces mémos que Nicolas Sarkozy et ses conseillers fréquentent assidument l'ambassade américaine de Paris, ainsi que les dignitaires américains de passage en France.

Signe de cette proximité, Nicolas Sarkozy, qui n'avait certes pas fait mystère qu'il pensait à la présidentielle "pas seulement en se rasant" et qui ne masquait pas ses ambitions, annonce sa candidature aux Américains le 1^er août 2005, soit seize mois avant qu'il ne l'annonce, le 29 novembre 2006, au peuple français. "Je vais être candidat en 2007", confirme M. Sarkozy à l'ambassadeur Craig Stapleton et au conseiller économique du président Bush, Allan Hubbard. Pour la France, c'est déjà à l'époque une évidence, mais encore non déclarée. Pour les Américains, cette confirmation avant l'heure est une marque de confiance.

…Nicolas Sarkozy fait, lors de ce rendez-vous, une véritable déclaration d'amour aux Américains. "Sarkozy a exprimé son admiration pour le président Bush, écrit l'ambassadeur. Sarkozy a dit que, comme le président [Bush], lui aussi mettait un point d'honneur à tenir sa parole et à affronter honnêtement les problèmes réels de son pays."

Le ministre de l'intérieur n'hésite pas à critiquer la position diplomatique française devant des officiels étrangers. "Sarkozy s'est lamenté de l'état troublé des relations entre les Etats-Unis et la France au cours des dernières années, écrit le diplomate. Affirmant que c'est quelque chose que lui 'ne ferait jamais', il a évoqué l'utilisation, par Chirac et Villepin, du veto de la France au Conseil de sécurité [de l'ONU] contre les Etats-Unis en février 2002 [sur l'invasion de l'Irak] comme étant une réaction injustifiable et excessive."

…Nicolas Sarkozy, toujours à l'occasion du passage d'Allan Hubbard, devient plus personnel. "'Ils m'appellent 'Sarkozy l'Américain', a-t-il dit. 'Eux considèrent que c'est une insulte, mais je le prends comme un compliment'. Sarkozy a souligné à quel point il 'se reconnaît' dans les valeurs américaines", écrit le diplomate. "Il a raconté que, lorsqu'il était enfant, il a dit à son père qu'il souhaitait devenir président. Son père d'origine hongroise a rétorqué 'dans ce cas, va en Amérique, parce qu'avec un nom comme Sarkozy, tu n'y parviendras jamais ici'. Prouver que c'était faux, a dit Sarkozy, est la pierre angulaire de ses efforts à la fois pour réussir [à devenir président] et à transformer la France."

L'ambassadeur en conclut que "Sarkozy est viscéralement pro-américain" et qu'"il voit sa propre ascension comme étant le reflet d'une saga à l'américaine".

Needless to say, Le Monde's French readership is hopping mad by Sarkozy's free market tendencies, by his pro-Americanism, by his "poodleness", and by his "treason" (to Chirac and de Villepin), leading Un "imbécile" to declare:

Noel avant l'heure pour les eminents commentateurs du Monde: antiamericanisme et antisarkozysme se rencontrent, livres sur un plateau par le compte-rendu pas-tendancieux du Monde. C'est vraiment trop, il ne fallait pas. Le millieme commentateur qui sort les memes cliches gagne le Grand Prix de la Previsibilite.

The Wikileaks Scandal Debated on France 24's Cable Channel

Another debate on the France 24 news cable channel, the day before the channel held a debate on America's mid-term elections, concerned the Wikileaks scandals.

Wikileaks : pour le meilleur ou pour le pire ? partie 1 et partie 2.

Journalisme d'investigation ou site à abattre ? Pour certains, Wikileaks.org incarne l'avenir du journalisme d'investigation et pour d'autres, c'est le site à abattre. Vendredi 22 octobre, WikiLeaks révélait 400 000 documents sur la guerre en Irak - « Iraq War Logs » - soit la « plus grande fuite de l'histoire », a titré la presse. Alors peut-on encore mener une guerre en toute transparence et doit-on tout dire ? Quels sont les risques liés à ce site d'information ?
LE DÉBAT

* Tristan MENDÈS-FRANCE, Documentariste, blogueur d’Egoblog.net
* Ellen WASYLINA, Analyste géopolitique, Republicans Abroad France
* Rémy OURDAN, Journaliste, Le monde
* Michel GOYA, Auteur de « Irak, les armées du chaos », Directeur d'études à l'IRSEM

Joining WikiLeaks' Latest Iraq War "Spill", Le Monde Lambastes Yanks While Ignoring the Fact that Most Iraqi Civilians Were Killed by… Other Iraqis

Referring to Hannah Arendt's "banality of evil" phrase (in its main article's final sentence) and thus, directly or otherwise, to the heinous crimes of the Nazi era, Le Monde reveals that it is among the newspapers and/or associations involved with the latest WikiLeaks "spill" of Pentagon documents on the Iraq War.

Le Monde, conjointement avec le New York Times, le Guardian, le Bureau of investigative journalism et le Spiegel, a pu consulter en avant-première 400 000 rapports de l'armée américaine en Irak, rendus publics ce vendredi par le site Wikileaks, spécialisé dans la publication de documents confidentiels. Il s'agit des rapports d'incidents, rédigés par les officiers sur le terrain, qui constituent le fichier SIGACTS ("significant activity") des forces américaines de janvier 2004 à décembre 2009. Une masse de documents qui décrivent, jour à près jour, les attentats, les échanges de tirs, les fouilles de caches d'armes, les arrestations, et les violences contre les civils.

Le Monde's team of reporters — Patrice Claude, Yves Eudes, Rémy Ourdan, and Damien Leloup — also has articles on Iraqi policemen's use of torture and on civilian deaths at military checkpoints, along with a graph of the conflict's victims.

The first thing to notice is that the leftist media still has no idea about what a country at war — never mind a country (previously) run by a bloodthirsty psychopath — is.

Les violences des soldats américains, notamment lors de l'arrestation des suspects, est aussi évoquée par les 400 000 fichiers.

"The violence of the American soldiers, notably during the arrest of suspects, is also mentioned in the 400,000 files." Le Monde speaks of "suspects" as if they were lethargic Amsterdam marijuana users and not heavily-armed fanatics ready, and eager, to use their weapons.

But most revealing, perhaps, is how all the violence is attributed to the Americans and/or to their allies (Iraqi or foreign) and to the very fact of their presence in Iraq. The money quote of blame by association remarks goes to the following sentence, in the main article, whose passive tense suggests that Yank soldiers are to blame for the "victims of summary executions" by the very fact of… simply discovering the "corpses of thousands of women and men"!

Les cadavres de milliers de femmes et d'hommes, victimes d'exécutions sommaires, ont été découverts par les soldats américains.

To hammer the blame by association home, the article immediately segues into the sentence "ading" that "in the span of six years, those same soldiers [!] killed at least 600 civilians at checkpoints"

Ces mêmes soldats ont tué au moins six cent civils en six ans aux checkpoints, ou en ouvrant le feu sur des véhicules pris pour une menace.

(Ain't it nice to know how nicely our French allies treat their American friends?)

The blame by association is shown again in the article referring to the graph of the conflict's victims, which opens with a sentence stating that those who — "by far" — have paid the heaviest price in the war are "civilians, victims of political and criminal assassinations as well as of attacks and 'collateral damage' provoked by the American army and the Iraqi police".

Les civils, victimes à la fois des assassinats politiques et crapuleux, des attentats et des "dégâts collatéraux" provoqués par l'armée américaine et la police irakienne, ont payé de très loin le plus lourd tribut à la guerre.

Notice the wording? "Civilians, victims of political and criminal assassinations" — oh yes, when we are speaking of political and criminal assassinations, i.e., crimes by other Iraqis (more than a few of who must be members of Saddam Hussein's former Ba'athist party), we do not hear who the perpetrators are — "as well as of attacks and 'collateral damage' provoked by the American army and the Iraqi police" — but when the damage is done by the Americans and their Iraqi allies, then, by all means, we must hear (all) about it, we do hear (all) about it (and how!)…

And as this part of the sentence comes in second and last (if it was really felt to be necessary not to mention the legions of Iraqi killers, it would have been more honest to turn the two phrases around, so that the sentence read "civilians, victims of attacks and 'collateral damage,' provoked by the American army and the Iraqi police, as well as of political and criminal assassinations"), it follows that Americans and their Iraqi allies are viewed as responsible (as guilty?) for all the violence…

There is another "by far" — see below — but, because it doesn't reflect badly on the Americans and because it doesn't make the Iraqi population look like poor harmless victims, nowhere does Le Monde specify this statistic. At least the New York Times does so:

The reports make it clear that most civilians, by far, were killed by other Iraqis.

Update: Needless to say, the French mention nothing about the bogus, trumped-up figures of lost Iraqi lives along with the discovery of, yes, WMDs in Iraq…