Blog about politics (mideast and pro-Israel, Canadian and local Montreal), world events, and random thoughts.

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The World I Know is updated on a semi-regular basis by segacs.

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11:41 AM
And in yet another suicide attack, 16 people are dead after a suicide bombing at a Moscow rock concert:

Two women suicide bombers killed 16 other people when they blew themselves apart at an open-air rock festival staged at a Moscow airfield on Saturday, Russia's interior minister said.

Boris Gryzlov blamed Chechens opposed to President Vladimir Putin's plan, announced a day earlier, to hold a Kremlin-run local presidential election in Chechnya in October.

The minister told reporters at the scene that 20 people were injured.

If it was carried out by Chechens, the suicide attack would be a new instance of a tactic used by the region's Muslim militants, including several women, only relatively recently in their decade-old campaign to break from Moscow's control.

Israel has long been warning the world that if the terror tactics being used against it are allowed to be successful there, they will be exported around the globe. The warning went unheeded. And now suicide bombings are virtually everywhere, and people are starting to notice but it's too late.

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7:37 PM
44 people are dead after a suicide attack on a mosque in Pakistan:

A suicide attack on a packed Shi'ite mosque in southwestern Pakistan during Friday prayers killed at least 44 people and wounded 65 others, the country's leading private emergency service said.

Describing what was the worst such attack in Pakistan in recent years, witnesses at the main Shi'ite mosque in the center of the city of Quetta reported seeing gunmen firing on worshippers before at least one suicide bomber blew himself up.

[ . . . ]

No group claimed responsibility for the raid, but officials said it appeared to be linked to rivalry between minority Shi'ites and majority Sunni Muslims, which has often exploded into violence in the past.


Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said it was too early to say who was to blame.

Which Jewish imperialism will be blamed for this terror attack?

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2:34 PM
More stupid ideas coming from the city of Montreal, whose councilors seem to have nothing better to do. The city has floated a plan to get rid of all the surface parking lots downtown by developing them into housing units, high-rises, or multi-level parking lots, or turning them into green space:

City council wants to eliminate all 240 surface parking lots, potentially reducing the number of spots available, in a push to beautify Montreal and encourage commuters to use public transit.

It has commissioned a study to determine the availability of parking spots and the need for parking downtown, said Robert Libman, the city's executive committee member in charge of land use.

"We're not talking about eliminating parking spots, we're taking about eliminating the outdoor parking lots," he said yesterday at city hall.

"They're ugly, they're messy, people throw their garbage there, you have these run-down shacks sitting in the middle of them, and they have great development potential."

Fine. They're ugly. But they provide the majority of the parking spots downtown. Thousands of people park there daily, and it certainly won't improve commerce, industry, or pollution if they have nowhere to park.

And "encourage people to use public transit" would seem like more of a sincere goal if public tranist was a viable alternative. But, as anyone living in the suburbs will tell you, it's far from. There's no metro out where I live, and buses are infrequent and inconvenient.

For example, heading downtown on a Saturday night in the summer would take 25 minutes to drive each way. According to the STM website's "Tous Azimuts" tool, it would take 1 3/4 hours to make the same trip down, and require taking two buses and the metro. I couldn't calculate the route to come back home at closing time, because the search tool only works between 6am and 10pm. But from experience I can say it takes well over 2 hours. And that's straight home - imagine having to pick someone up or meet up elsewhere first!

Another example: when I was a university student, coming home from downtown in the middle of the afternoon after a class would take me 25 minutes by car. Tous Azimuts tells me it would take 1 1/2 hours, with a route involving two metro lines and a rush-hour bus. Attempting the same route outside of rush hour would tack on an extra 45 minutes.

Going shopping downtown on a Sunday afternoon? Forget it! By the time I got there, it would be time to turn around and come home.

To be sure, I have at times driven halfway into the city and left my car at one of the STM public lots to take the metro from there. But it is an additional 10 minutes from that point to get to virtually anywhere downtown. And leaving my car to take the metro means that not only am I paying for both public and autmotive transport, but that it will take three times as long.

Some major cities have managed to implement prohibative driving measures aimed to prevent people from taking their cars downtown. London, for example, recently added the "congestion charge" that keeps cars out of the downtown core at peak hours, or forces owners to pay a stiff charge. However, London has a world-class public transit system. The Underground, while expensive and often on strike or in repair, does go virtually everywhere in all directions. And there's a fairly extensive night-bus system after hours. Or New York City, which has a natural deterrant to driving, namely the traffic, has created a culture of dedicated walkers and subway-goers, and the subway is convenient for most commuters.

None of this is true in Montreal, where the metro goes to only one stop on the South Shore, nowhere in Laval, and nowhere West of Cote-Vertu. Not only that, but lines are infrequent, stoppages constant, and the idea was even floated of stopping service on weekends. The commuter trains - a good idea in theory - are even worse, as there are virtually no trains outside rush hour, and the lines are only useful to people going straight downtown.

Montreal is going about this backwards. If you want less people to drive, give them a viable alternative. Increasing gas taxes and parking fees, removing parking spots, and other "stick" methods don't work without the "carrot" of improved public transit. Until the government makes a real commitment to improving public transit, we'll keep on driving. And eliminating parking lots won't improve the situation, it'll only make things worse.

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9:55 AM
Happy Independance Day to our neighbours to the south!

For those Gazette subscribers, Gil Troy has an excellent opinion piece in today's paper saluting the values of American democracy and liberty that were enshrined in the Declaration of Independance. Unfortunately it didn't make it to the online edition. But I'll echo his sentiments in saying that there is no such thing as a perfect society, but the genius of the American system is that it recognized flaws and imperfections and created mechanisms for progress and change.

To all you Americans reading this, hope you're enjoying your holiday, and careful with those firecrackers.

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1:14 PM
If this is is actually true, then the ISM is a lot more than just misguided. An Israeli blogger claims that this is a paraphrased transcript of a prank phonecall he made to the ISM back in May (via Damian Penny):

"If we send you money, can I be sure it reaches the resistance and helps conduct glorious acts like the ones we've seen in Tel Aviv? I don't want to invest in some organization that wouldn't fight the Jews" I pushed harder. He had to realize this was a prank. He had too. He can't possibly be dumb enough to fall for that, can he?
"We do not officially endorse acts of violence"
A ray of light? Could it be we were all wrong about ISM? I was quickly proven wrong, as the guy on the other side continued:
"But I can guarantee you that your money will reach the right hands in our struggle"
"Stop being diplomatic with me, I want to know if my money reaches the brave martyrs who sacrifice their lives to free Palestine from the Jews."
"I'm not supposed to speak about it..."
"This is a very simple question. Yes or No?"
"Yes"

No comment on the credibility of this. But I can't say it would surprise me too much.

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1:10 PM
Attacks by the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade, which has rejected a cease-fire with Israel, has forced Israel to conduct a raid on Gaza, during which a terrorist was killed:

Israeli troops shot dead a Palestinian militant during a raid in the West Bank and temporarily blocked Gaza's main road on Thursday, angering Palestinians who accused Israel of undermining U.S. peacemaking.

The killing in the West Bank town of Qalqilya and the almost six-hour road closure, three days after the long-blocked highway was reopened, followed attacks by militants, Israel said.

[ . . . ]

Israeli troops shot dead 30-year-old Mahmoud Shawar of the al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades during an overnight raid in Qalqilya. A second member of the Brigades was wounded and arrested, Palestinian security sources and the Israeli army said.

"We in the al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades announce we are not complying with the cease-fire as long as the occupation continues raiding our lands and killing our people," a local leader of the Brigades said through loudspeakers as Shawar was buried.

So the Palestinians continue to attack Israel on a daily basis after the declaration of the so-called "cease-fire", and the world ignores it. The al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade never agreed to the cease-fire in the first place. And yet it's Israel that's accused of "undermining the peace process".

How utterly predictable.

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12:21 PM
Now here's something you don't see every day: A protest in Monrovia, Liberia against Charles Taylor:

Hundreds of people demonstrated in Liberia's capital on Thursday in an unprecedented show of opposition to President Charles Taylor, a day after President Bush told him to leave the country.

"Taylor must go" and "No more Taylor, we want Bush," chanted more than 400 people outside the U.S. embassy as American Marines in flak jackets and helmets kept watch from behind sandbagged posts on the roof.

[ . . . ]

After 14 years of almost non-stop violence, Liberia is a ruined international pariah, overrun by a generation of drugged-up, drunken fighters who have spread chaos in the region.


Many Liberians think only U.S. troops can save them.

There's no doubt that the people of Liberia, as well as some fifteen thousand refugees from Sierra Leone who are now in danger in Liberia, are fed up with the conflict. But notice anything unusual about this? As in, people actually praising the U.S. for a change?

Update 07/04: Taylor has caved to U.S. pressure and agreed to flee and seek asylum.

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12:51 AM
Antonia "oops, I didn't realize I was plugging a Nazi site" Zerbisias is at it again in her Toronto Star column. This time, she's attacking the Global documentary "Confrontation at Concordia", which she claims is unfair to the poor rioters:

But any fair-minded observer would expect Himel to back up his allegations with facts or evidence. Yet the film provides little of either.

For example, student leader Samer Elatrash, a Canadian of Palestinian parentage, is described as wanting `'the destruction of Israel as a Jewish state'' and seeing `'Israel wiped out.''

Harsh words when what he really espouses is "a secular state that's built on the simple premise of respect for human rights, respect for cultural rights, respect for religious rights, that don't trespass on anybody else's human, cultural and religious rights.''

Okay, let's be generous and assume she's such a moron that she doesn't realize that what Elatrash said means exactly the destruction of Israel as a Jewish state. But not one to stop with merely sounding dumb, Zerbisias apparently feels compelled to throw in a few conspiracy theory allegations:

Himel makes no apologies for his documentary, adding that he is "not aware of the complaints'' against it. Fair enough. He's based in Israel where he reports for Global. But there's no excuse for his not mentioning - or even knowing - that Netanyahu's tour was co-sponsored by the Winnipeg-based Asper Foundation, established by his ultimate employer, CanWest Global chair Izzy Asper. Even a simple search of the Montreal Gazette, also a CanWest news organ, would have revealed that.

Pretty much the entire article reads like it was dictated by certain pro-Palestinian activists at Concordia - who shall remain nameless for now - but one of whom pointed me to the article in the first place by proudly republishing it on the Link's site. I wonder if he realizes that quoting Zerbisias is about as credible as . . . well . . . never mind, I think he quotes Chomsky too.

The complaints filed against the documentary, by the CSU, SPHR, and MSA, are, as far as I can tell, based on the fact that "it makes them look bad". Yeah, whatever. They made themselves look bad.

And besides, last I checked, there's free speech in this country. Documentaries are allowed to be biased to reflect the views of whoever makes them. If I wanted to make a documentary about how the Earth is flat, or how it rains pineapples every second Thursday, then hey, all in the name of art, right? But the minute anything gets published that actually tries to show the truth as perceived by the students most affected, well, out come the complaints. I'm the first to admit that this film isn't going to win any film festival prizes. It's got some choppy editing and questionable narration, and artistically it's probably not worth all that much. But none of that makes it illegal.

By the way, if you're interested in viewing the documentary, copies are being sold online at canada.com. Or, if you don't feel like feeding your money into the big Zionist conspiracy machine of CanWestGlobal, the show is being re-aired on Prime on Sunday at 8pm.

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11:54 AM
And the winner is . . . (drumroll please) . . .

Vancouver 2010! Yep, in seven years, the winter olympics are heading out to Canada's west coast.

Salzburg, Austria, considered the main competitor to Vancouver, was ousted in the first round of IOC voting. A second ballot held immediately afterwards brought Vancouver to an easy victory over Pyeongchang, South Korea.

The entire Canadian delegation had loonies in their pockets for good luck during their final presentation before the IOC. Hey, if it worked for the hockey players . . .

As a Canadian I'm very proud of this decision. Now let's just hope that Vancouver doesn't get its own version of the Big Owe.

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11:07 AM
It's official: we can't refer to Toronto as Sarsville anymore. The WHO has declared Toronto free of SARS:

"When 20 days, or twice the incubation period, have passed without detection of a new case, the chain of human-to-human transmission is considered broken," it added.

This is certainly good news for Toronto's lagging economy, which may now begin to pick up again. Let's just hope that health officials and workers don't let their guards down too quickly, so that a repeat outbreak doesn't materialize.

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10:07 AM
In the midst of all the international attention being paid to the "plight" of the Palestinian refugees, the forgotten refugees are the hundreds of thousands of Jews who were driven out of Arab countries. Various groups and individuals, including Montrealer and Federal MP Irwin Cotler, have been fighting to educate people about them and to achieve recognition. Now, Britain has pledged to take up their cause:

British officials have promised to make "every effort" to highlight the cause of Jewish refugees from Arab countries within the European Union.

[ . . . ]

The JJAC report, entitled "The Middle East's Forgotten Jewish Refugees," notes that just 8,000 Jews now live in Arab countries, down from 900,000 in 1947.

It is seeking international recognition of the "de facto population exchange" of Jews and Palestinians, which "refutes the Arab claim for a 'physical' right of return."

The difference between the two refugee groups - which numbered roughly the same - was that the Palestinians were sent to live in refugee camps behind barbed wire and left to rot in squalid conditions by their Arab brethren, so that their hatred and resentment could build and they could be used as political pawns against Israel.

In contrast, Israel accepted all of the Jewish refugees who wished to enter with open arms, housing them, educating them, and integrating them into Israeli society. Today their families are second- and third-generation Israeli citizens. And Israel resettled them with far less land, money, and resources than the Arab countries had available. Israel managed this because compassion for the plight of fellow Jews demanded as much.

So today, while the world moans about the stateless Palestinian refugees, nobody seems to remember that Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, all had an influx of refugees and all denied them citizenship, rights, or anything resembling a life. And now these countries are asking Israel to pay, while at the same time lobbying to deny any kind of compensation or even recognition of the 800,000 Jewish refugees from Arab lands.

The recognition of the issue by the British government is a good start. If more EU states took notice, that would be even better.

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9:55 AM
Update on the cease-fire: Meryl Yourish has been tracking the violations. So far, pretty much as expected.

Next we'll see the different terrorist factions falling all over each other to get the prestigious claim of being the group to have destroyed this latest peace effort. They know they can do it. The world refuses to condemn them, and more than half their population supports them.

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12:16 AM
Happy Canada Day!

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10:36 PM
Who bet less than 2 days?

The ceasefire has been broken with Palestinian gunmen shooting at an IDF post today.

Frankly, I'm amazed it lasted as long as it did.

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10:33 PM
Vancouver 2010?

With only 2 days until the IOC vote for the 2010 Winter Olympics, the three contenders - Vancouver, Salzburg, and Pyeongchang are campaigning to the end. And some are saying that Vancouver seems to have the edge:

With most of the 120-odd IOC members already arrived here for the 115th IOC Session, Vancouver is the name that quickly comes to the fore when the talk goes to Wednesday's vote.

But despite growing rumours that Vancouver could win in the first round most senior IOC members see it going to a second round and that it will be a close run battle against Salzburg.

Of course my Canadian pride would love to see Vancouver win it. But I'm surprised there's been so little talk about the bid's main handicap, namely, transportation. The road between Vancouver and Whistler is a 2-lane scenic route built on the edge of the mountains before the dropoff to the sea. Transportation within Vancouver is difficult at the best of times, with the city not having a single highway, thus forcing everyone to take city streets. And the excessive politeness of Vancouver drivers, who will stop if they sense someone might want to cross at a crosswalk next year, tends to slow things down to a crawl.

Still, it would be kinda cool if Vancouver won the bid.

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