News and Analysis (2/4/08)

Pentagon proposes highest defense budget since WWII, mostly for ongoing imperial adventures Iraq and Afghanistan…

• Proposed Military Spending Is Highest Since WWII (New York Times)

…but hasn’t used the money spent so far to effectively act against Al-Qaeda terrorists operating freely between Afghanistan and Pakistan:

• Al-Qaeda Commander Moved Freely in Pakistan (Washington Post)

Investigative reporter Seymour Hersh corroborates other findings that the mystery Syrian facility hit by Israel’s provocative bombing was not nuclear:

• Sy Hersh Confirms: Syrian Facility Bombed by Israel was Not Nuclear (Raw Story)

Recent arrest of ultranationalist gang fuels speculation about its ties to other important arch-secularists and nationalist extremists within Turkey’s state institutions:

• ‘Deep State Plot’ Grips Turkey (BBC News)

Reformist cleric Hadi Ghabel gets slapped with a three-year jail sentence for allegedly jeopardizing national security and “insulting” both the Supreme Leader and the judiciary…

• Reformist Cleric is Jailed in Iran (BBC News)

…meanwhile Iran’s commerce chamber goes on a PR blitz to argue against further Western economic pressure, warning that such policies were “likely to backfire”:

• Sanctions Likely To Backfire On West, Iranian Business Warns (Financial Times)

“We have suffered terrible casualties in the war with the Islamic terrorists, but the only real victory they’ve achieved was the one the Bush administration handed them when it replaced law with vengeance and sanctioned torture.”—Timothy Rutten, LA Times columnist

• Mukasey’s Confession (Los Angeles Times)

Alejandro

Alejandro Beutel is program assistant for the Minaret of Freedom Institute with expertise in religious freedom, democratization and security issues.