Among the credible witnesses is a Pakistani-American, businessman Mansoor Ijaz, now a fixture on talk shows dealing with Pakistan and terrorism. Ijaz was an intimate and fundraiser for President Clinton, and he avers that efforts to share Sudan's intelligence with the Clinton government were rejected and ignored. Additional intelligence about Fazul Abdullah Mohamed, who was part of the plot to bomb the embassy in Nairobi, was accepted by the FBI but rejected by the State Department. Furthermore, damning evidence about Mamdouh Mamdouh Salim, providing a link to Bin Laden and the suicide bombers that targeted America, was disparaged by the State Department because it did not fit what former Ambassador to the Sudan Tim Carney called "politicized intelligence," i.e. the conventional wisdom at the State Department. And so, Carney states, the U.S. "lost access to a mine of material on Bin Laden."

In the aftermath of Clinton's televised confession to a dalliance with Monica Lewinsky, the U.S. bombed the Al-Shifa factory in Khartoum. President Clinton claimed, Rose writes, "on the basis of what is now acknowledged to be faulty intelligence, that it was owned by Bin Laden and was making nerve gas. In fact, Al-Shifa had no connection to Bin Laden. It made vaccines and medicine, and had contracts with the UN." Subsequent messages from Sudan's ambassador to the United States that the Sudan was willing to share intelligence and cooperate on anti-terrorist efforts were ignored.

Finally, in mid -2000, Clinton sent an investigative team to Sudan that failed to find any evidence that there were terrorist camps or government sponsored cells in Sudan. But it is unconscionable that, as Rose states, "Madeleine Albright and her assistant secretary for Africa, Susan Rice, apparently preferred to trust their instincts that Sudan was America's enemy, and so refused to countenance its assistance against the deepest threat to American Security since 1945." According to Ambassador Tim Rice, "it was worse than a crime. It was a foul-up."

Madeleine Albright's obtuseness is well known. After all, she did not find out that she was Jewish until the mid nineties. However, the real failure resides with the Commander In Chief. His defenders may well argue that possible perjury, impeachment, draft dodging, prevarication, and sleazy last minute pardons are all personal foibles. But there is no spinmeister who can dismiss his failure to confront terrorism.

Queen Noor of Jordan

In the aftermath of September 11, American-born Lisa Halaby, the widow of Jordan's late King Hussein, embarked on a media campaign on behalf of American Arabs, who are, if the queen is to be believed, almost to a man "peace-loving" and patriotic Americans. Her interviewers asked no questions about the anti-American tone of many of the sermons in American mosques. No doubt they had long forgotten that just prior to the Gulf War, Queen Noor made several appearances on American TV urging Americans to protest military action against Iraq. King Hussein and the PLO were both advocates of Saddam Hussein in that campaign, going so far as to make Jordan air space a "no fly zone" for American aircraft.

Furthermore, the queen, who exhibits such sentimental concern for the Palestinian Arabs, was not asked about her late husband's role in killing severalthousand Palestinian Arabs and expelling an equal number in the episode remembered as "Black September." Indeed, Hussein was justified in his action against the PLO, and unfortunately was forced to welcome elements of the organization back when its members were expelled from Lebanon. Who could forget the sight of the unfortunate king having to kiss all that stubble on both cheeks?

Perhaps as a result of her long sojourn in the Arab world, the Queen has a problem with facts. As part of her effort to show how "American" Arab-Americans were, she proudly asserted that the song "New York, New York" was written by Arab-American Paul Anka. Actually there are two songs named "New York, New York." One is from the musical On the Town, with music by Leonard Bernstein and book by Adolph Green and Betty Comden. The second, to which the Queen presumably referred, was written by Kander and Ebb, the duo that wrote the musicals Cabaret and Chicago. All five of the above-named are Jews.

To our mind, the aforementioned Mansoor Ijaz struck a far better note than the comely queen. When asked during several TV appearances what his thoughts were on "profiling" American Muslims, he replied that Muslims have a particular obligation to help the inves-

January 2002               - 11 -               Outpost