Steve,

1. Let me start from the end because the issue of expressing "anti-government views in Syria or Lebanon or Iraq or Serbia" can be settled quickly. No, you cannot PUBICLY express anti-government views in Syria, Lebanon or Iraq unless you want to end up in prison. But I am expressing them there in private only, and here in private and in public. Here in private, I had numerous discussions during which I criticized all the Arab regimes.Unfortunately, you were not part of those discussions. In public, you can find this criticism put in context in my website Mideaswatch, under Exchange with Michael: mideaswatch/exchanges/exchanges-list.html.

2. I am not "anti-Clinton partisan Republican." In fact, I am neither Republican nor Democrat. I am pro-honesty and justice. And I will criticize anyone who shows signs of dishonesty and injustice. For your information, I criticized the Gulf War, its premises and its results and Bush to my knowledge is a Republican.

3. As far as your first paragraph is concerned, all I can say is that it is totally irrelevant to the issue we are discussing which is once again Clinton's doctrine of going to war for humanitarian reasons.

4. Regarding your second paragraph, I will ignore the American Abolitionists because it is also irrelevant. Your explanation about NATO is to a great extent inaccurate because NATO is the United States. Let us not kid ourselves without the US there will be no NATO. NATO/US is not in the business of unifying Europe but to impose, after the collapse of the Soviet block, a new world order that it will dominate and control. But this is another issue.

5. You finally devoted one line to "answer" my question by saying "If you  want to discuss the Tamil situation, that's another question." Steve, THIS IS THE QUESTION that, in spite of all what you have written so far, you failed to answer.

Medhat
June 29, 1999