WHY BOMB IRAN WHEN YOU CAN BECOME IRAN?

"That seems to be the thinking behind the Israeli government's endorsement of legislation that will require human rights NGOs in Israel (e.g., B'Tselem, Machsomwatch, Breaking the Silence, Adalah, etc.) to publicize contributions from foreign governments, not only in an annual report (they all do that anyway), but every single time they host an event, have a meeting, publish a report, issue a news release, whether they have received outside funding for that particular occasion or not."

Read further...

http://themagneszionist.blogspot.com/2010/02/why-bomb-iran-when-you-can-become-iran.html

Hoffen auf den Mythos England

Nach der Räumung des größten Flüchtlingscamps "Jungle" hält in Calais der Zustrom von Migranten an - wie auch die Repression der Behörden. VON TOBIAS MÜLLER, taz
http://www.taz.de/1/politik/europa/artikel/1/hoffen-auf-den-mythos-england/

Zurückgeblieben ist ein Standbild. Eine bizarre Brache von der Ausdehnung mehrerer Fußballfelder. Was nach dem Fällen der Bäume noch übrig war, wurde planiert. Die Spuren der Bulldozer haben sich tief in den Boden gegraben, über Schlafsäcke und Decken, die im feuchten Sand vor sich hin schimmeln. Zerknüllte Hosen, Pullover und einzelne Schuhe liegen auf dem matschigen Grund. Auch Matratzenspiralen finden sich zwischen Brettern und Plastikplanen, und jede Menge Abfall. Ein Busdepot, ein Elektrizitätswerk und ein paar Lagerhallen säumen das Gelände in der Zone Industrielle des Dunes unweit des Hafens. Seit Monaten bewegt sich hier nichts mehr.

Auf einmal kommt Leben in die eingefrorene Szene. Unvermittelt taucht eine Gestalt aus dem Gebüschstreifen am Rand auf. Sie trägt Jogginghose, einen Parka und eine dunkelblaue Mütze. Der Afghane wohnte früher hier, im Jungle, dem größten der elenden Flüchtlingscamps unter freiem Himmel, für die Calais berühmt wurde. Sein Gesicht ist zerfurcht, über 40 Jahre ist er alt, doppelt so alt wie die meisten hier, und anders als sie spricht er nur brüchiges Englisch. "Finished", sagt er, und weist auf die Ödnis um sich. Mit einer scharfen Handbewegung deutet er den Bulldozereinsatz an und zuckt die Schultern. Dann schlurft er weiter, überquert die Straße und verschwindet dahinter in einem Waldstück. Dort wohnt er jetzt.

Es ist eine Szene mit Symbolkraft. Die groß angelegte Räumungsaktion des Jungle, in dem im Sommer noch um die tausend meist afghanische Migranten unter erbärmlichen Bedingungen lebten, holte im September die Weltpresse in die Hafenstadt am Ärmelkanal. Sie wurde Zeuge einer öffentlichen Inszenierung: Die französische Regierung wollte klarstellen, dass es ihr von nun an ernst sei mit der Bekämpfung der Transitmigration nach Großbritannien. Knapp 300 Menschen wurden nach offiziellen Angaben festgenommen, Einwanderungsminister Éric Besson klopfte sich für den erfolgreichen Schlag gegen Schlepperbanden vor laufenden Kameras selber auf die Schulter und kündigte an, Calais werde bis zum Jahresende "wasserdicht gegen illegale Einwanderung".

Transitmigration

Sangatte: 1999 eröffnete das Rote Kreuz in Sangatte bei Calais ein Lager, um Flüchtlinge aus dem Kosovo auffangen zu können. Neue Migrantenströme aus Irak und Afghanistan sorgten schon bald für Überfüllung. Zehntausende versuchte illegale Einreisen belasteten das Verhältnis zwischen Paris und London. 2002 wurde das Lager geschlossen.

Verteilung: Danach verteilte sich die Transitmigration entlang der Kanalküste, Calais aber blieb das Zentrum. Flüchtlinge errichteten Jungle genannte Elendscamps und besetzten leerstehende Gebäude. Seit 2004 verstärken Paris und London die gemeinsamen Kontrollen.

Jungle: Im Juli 2009 beschlossen beide Länder eine Intensivierung. Im September wurde der größte Jungle zerstört. Hunderte Migranten sind in Paris untergetaucht. Der stetige Zustrom hält die Zahl in Calais bei rund 300.

Die Wirklichkeit sieht anders aus. Zwar sind mehrere hundert Transitmigranten in Paris untergetaucht, andere haben sich über die Küste verteilt, nach Dunkerque, Boulogne und bis herunter nach Cherbourg, um von dort versteckt auf einem Lkw mit der Fähre oder dem Eurostarzug die andere Seite des Kanals zu erreichen. Doch bereits am Abend nach der Zerstörung des Jungle trafen neue Flüchtlinge in Calais ein. Zu Beginn des Winters sind es rund 300. Ihre Hoffnung auf Asyl oder wenigstens Schwarzarbeit und wenig Ausweiskontrollen mag der dortigen Realität immer weniger entsprechen. Doch der Mythos England überdauert Planierraupen und Kettensägen, so wie er seit Jahren immun ist gegen die Aufrüstung der Straße von Dover zu einer der am schwersten zu überwindenden Grenzen der Welt. Nach der Räumung ist vor der Räumung, das ist das Gesetz von Calais, und so geht der Afghane mit dem faltigen Gesicht einfach hinüber, in den neuen Jungle.

Es ist nicht die einzige provisorische Siedlung. Auch hinter dem verlassenen Hovercraft- Terminal bieten die Dünen weiterhin Unterschlupf für Gestrandete. Hazara-Jungle heißt der Streifen im lokalen Idiom, begrenzt von einem seltsam idyllischen Strand und der Straße, die den von grellweißen Zäunen umgebenen Hafen mit der Stadt verbindet. Sechs junge Hasaren, Angehörige einer farsisprechenden Minderheit in Zentralafghanistan, haben sich seit zwei Wochen dort niedergelassen. Seither findet in den Dünen ein makabres Katz- und Mausspiel statt: Beinahe jede Nacht, sagt der 28-jährige Ahmadi, bekommen sie Besuch von fünf oder sechs Polizeiwagen. Die Beamten decken das Areal in den Dünen mit Tränengas ein, zerstören die Zelte, nehmen die Schlafsäcke mit und stecken die unsanft Geweckten für den Rest der Nacht in eine Zelle. Am nächsten Tag werden sie freigelassen, kehren zurück in ihren Jungle und beginnen erneut, aus Planen, Paletten und Absperrgittern einen Unterschlupf zu zimmern. Nur hundert Meter vom neu errichteten Lager entfernt finden sich die Überbleibsel des vorigen. Reste eines Stuhls, verkohltes Holz, zertretenes Plastik. Seit Jahren können die Migranten von Calais davon ein Lied singen. Die, die erst im Herbst gekommen sind, kennen kein anderes. Die Frequenz der Einsätze hat massiv zugenommen.

Der Ort, an dem all diese Geschichten erzählt werden, liegt im heruntergekommenen Hafenviertel in Sichtweite der Fährterminals. Auf einem geräumigen Hof, den die Stadt ihnen zur Verfügung stellt, verteilen Hilfsorganisationen dreimal am Tag Mahlzeiten. Wie überall in Calais kreuzen Polizeistreifen hinter dem Zaun. Während der Essensausgabe belassen sie es bei Blicken, so ist es mit der Bürgermeisterin abgesprochen.

Zeit zum Durchatmen für Hamid und Ajmal. Die beiden 16-Jährigen wohnten im zerstörten Jungle. Seither schlafen sie unter Brücken, wenn sie nicht, wie gestern, von der Polizei mit Tritten geweckt und ihre Decken mit Wasser begossen werden. An eine Nacht auf der Wache eine Stunde von Calais entfernt haben sie sich inzwischen gewöhnt. Brauchen sie für den Rückweg zu lange, verpassen sie eine Mahlzeit. Kein Wunder, dass sie auf kältere Temperaturen warten: Ab zwei Grad unter null nämlich stellt eine städtische Schule ihre Turnhalle zur Verfügung.

Viele Minderjährige

Es sind unter anderem die vielen Minderjährigen, die Maureen McBrien nach Calais brachte. Bereits seit dem Sommer unterhält das UNHCR, das Flüchtlingskommissariat der Vereinten Nationen, eine Niederlassung in der Stadt. Seit dem Herbst wird sie von der Amerikanerin geleitet. 14 Jahre lang zog McBrien durch Flüchtlingscamps in Kriegsgebieten wie Kongo, Ruanda und Kosovo. Die Zustände in Calais hält sie für "schlimmer, als ich sie irgendwo anders gesehen habe".

Weil die Transitmigranten nach England wollen, stellt niemand in Frankreich einen Antrag auf Asyl. "Daher haben sie kein Recht auf staatliche Hilfe. Die einzige Unterstützung kommt hier aus der Zivilgesellschaft." Maureen Mc Brien und ihr Assistent besuchen daher die Camps der Umgebung, um Informationen zum Asylverfahren in Frankreich zu geben. Trotzdem geht ein Lachen über ihr Gesicht, als sie bei der Mittagsausgabe die Nachricht der letzten Nacht vernimmt: Drei Jugendliche haben es hinüber nach England geschafft. Der älteste ist 14, der jüngste 11.

Denen, die in dieser Nacht in einer verlassenen Schreinereihalle am Rand des Zentrums um das Feuer sitzen, steht dieser Schritt noch bevor. African Squat wird das riesige Gebäude genannt, denn die rund 30 Bewohner kommen aus dem Sudan, Eritrea und Somalia. Das Tor lässt sich nicht mehr schließen, es gibt keine Elektrizität, und brauchbares Feuerholz wird ein knappes Gut im feuchten Ärmelkanal-Winter. Zwei Tage zuvor saß Steven noch hier, ein eloquenter 23-Jähriger, der wie die meisten Sudanesen aus Darfur kommt. In knapp drei Wochen hatte er eine Handvoll Versuche unternommen, auf eine Fähre zu gelangen. Vergeblich. Während er seine Socken am Feuer trocknete, erzählte er von den Fluchtplänen, die jeder für sich alleine schmiede. "Jederzeit kann jemand einfach verschwinden. Vielleicht wollte er nur kurz raus in die Stadt, und wir sehen ihn nie wieder." Kurz darauf wurde Steven selbst zum letzten Mal gesehen.

Falsche Flagge?

Die offiziellen Darstellungen zum mißglückten Attentat in US-Flugzeug sind voller Widersprüche und Ungereimtheiten

Von Rainer Rupp

Bei dem angeblichen Terroranschlag des nigerianischen Unterhosenbombers Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab auf dem North­west-Flug 253 von Amsterdam nach Detroit am 25. Dezember 2009 hatten nicht wenige Beobachter ein Déjà vu: Alles schon mal erlebt. Tatsächlich spricht vieles für eine Operation unter falscher Flagge. Die Geschichte der US-Militärinterventionen rund um die Welt ist nachweislich von Verschwörungen geprägt.

Kriegsvorwände

Immer wieder sind US-Regierungen dabei ertappt worden, daß sie mit »false-flag«-Anschlägen und -Angriffen die Stimmung in der US-Öffentlichkeit erfolgreich manipulierten, um strategische Ziele durchzusetzen. Einige bekannte Beispiele: Die Explosion des US-Schlachtschiffs Maine 1898 im Hafen von Havanna, die den Anlaß für den Krieg der USA gegen Spanien lieferte; der sogenannte Zwischenfall in der Bucht von Tongking 1964, der den US-Angriff auf Nordvietnam legitimierte; der Plan der Bush-Administration, ein Flugzeug mit UN-Markierungen über dem Irak abzuschießen, um die Tat Saddam Hussein in die Schuhe zu schieben. Das sind Tatsachen, keine Theorien. Viel spricht dafür, daß auch der in Detroit festgenommene Nigerianer und seine zur »jemenitischen Al-Qaida« hochgejubelte Gruppe verrannter islamistischer Extremisten von einem der inzwischen 16 US-Geheimdienste unter falscher Flagge »geführt« wurde.

Von Interesse ist vor allem die Re­gion, aus der Abdulmutallab stammt. Die USA beziehen inzwischen ein Fünftel ihrer Ölimporte aus Nigeria und anderen westafrikanischen Ländern. Sogenannte Terrorismus-Experten behaupten derzeit in den westlichen Medien, es sei wichtig, daß US-Militär diesen Staaten im »Kampf gegen Al-Qaida« zu Hilfe komme. Bequemerweise reklamiert nun eine angebliche Al-Qaida Filiale im Jemen die Verantwortung für das mißglückte Attentat und serviert damit den US-Strategen den seit langem gesuchten Vorwand, in dem Land auf der Arabischen Halbinsel, das den Zugang zum Roten Meer kontrolliert, zu intervenieren.

Ein Déjà vu bereiten auch die zahlreichen Unstimmigkeiten und Widersprüche in den offiziellen Darstellungen der Vorgänge beim Flug 253. Dazu gehört z.B. das außerordentliche offizielle Desinteresse an dringenden und ernstzunehmenden Warnungen im Vorfeld des Anschlags. Gleiches gilt für ungewöhnliche Beobachtungen unabhängiger Tatzeugen. Das erneute angebliche Versagen der US-Geheimdienste paßt auffällig ins Muster. Ihnen waren alle persönlichen Daten des afrikanischen Studenten lange vorher bekannt. Und schließlich: Die Tatsache, daß der Anschlag mißglückte, ist ebenfalls eine Wiederholung von schon einmal Erlebtem. Ungewöhnlich ist diesmal lediglich, daß Al-Qaida prompt die Verantwortung für einen eklatanten Fehlschlag übernommen haben soll. Vor allem aber wird das vorgeführte Debakel der US-Geheimdienste dazu genutzt, um für sie noch mehr Machtbefugnisse und Geld zu fordern.

Ähnlichkeiten

Nach anfänglichem Leugnen hat die CIA inzwischen eingestanden, daß sie bereits seit August erste Warnungen erhalten hatte. Einen Monat vor dem Flug verfügte sie auch über den Namen und sogar die Paßnummer des Nigerianers, nachdem Abdulmutallabs Vater, ein ehemaliger Minister und einflußreicher Banker, im November in der US-Botschaft in Nigeria den dortigen CIA-Vertreter vor den terroristischen Absichten seines Sohnes bei dessen bevorstehender USA-Reise gewarnt hatte. Der Geheimdienst war somit informiert, daß der Sohn zu einem religiösen Fanatiker geworden war, der sich seit dem Sommer mehrere Monate in einem Ausbildungslager im Jemen aufgehalten hatte. Daraufhin, so CIA-Sprecher Paul Gimigliano in der New York Times vom 30. Dezember, habe die Agency alle betroffenen US-Behörden informiert, um sicherzustellen, daß Abdulmutallab »auf die Terroristenliste der US-Regierung gesetzt würde«. Was nicht geschah.

Nach geltender US-Antiterrorprozedur wird laut New York Times jeder Passagier, der sein Flugticket wie Abdulmutallab bar bezahlt und nur mit Handgepäck den Flug antritt, vor dem Start mit besonderer Sorgfalt untersucht. Obwohl alles in diesem Fall zutraf, passierte nichts. Die Tatsache, daß der Name des Studenten nicht auf der US-Flugverbotsliste stand, kann bei dem von Hysterie gespeisten immensen Aufwand, den die USA bei Terrorverdacht treiben, kaum ein Versehen gewesen sein. Vielmehr sind die Ähnlichkeiten zu den Anschlägen vom 11.September 2001 frappierend. In deren Vorfeld hatten drei regionale FBI-Teams der Antiterrorabteilung unabhängig voneinander Wind von der Sache bekommen, ihre weiteren Nachforschungen waren aber auf Anweisung von oben gestoppt worden. Auch die Tatsache, daß Abdulmutallabs Sprengsatz nicht explodierte, sondern nur eine Art Verpuffung produzierte, erinnert an den ersten Anschlag 1993 auf das New Yorker World Trade Center. Wie sich später bei der Gerichtsverhandlung herausstellte, war die »islamistische Terrorgruppe« komplett vom FBI unterwandert. Die Behörde besorgte sogar die Sprengsätze. Anstatt zu explodieren, qualmten sie nur, was aber auch zum Tod etlicher Unbeteiligter führte.

Siehe hierzu die detaillierte Beweisführung des Autors in dem Band: Das Schweigekartell. Fragen und Widersprüche zum 11. September. Kai Homilius Verlag, Berlin 2002

Klingt das vertraut?

English follows German

Vor dreissig Jahren marschierte die Sowjetarmee in Afghanistan ein. Die Besetzung dauerte zehn Jahre – der Versuch, eine säkulare Regierung zu etablieren, scheiterte. Nun wiederholt sich die Geschichte.

«Sie haben Russen erschossen», erzählte mir der junge Fallschirmspringer. Es war kalt. Ich traf in der Nähe von Charikar, nördlich von Kabul, auf seinen Verband, die 105. sowjetische Luftlandeeinheit. Er hatte eine verletzte Hand. Das Blut sickerte durch den Verband und befleckte den Ärmel seines Kampfanzugs. Er war noch fast ein Teenager, mit hellem Haar und blauen Augen. Neben uns im Graben lag ein sowjetischer Transportlaster auf dem Dach, die Rückseite völlig zerstört, zerfetzt von einer Mine.

Unter Schmerzen zeigte der junge Mann mit der Hand in Richtung der Berggipfel, über denen ein sowjetischer Helikopter kreiste. Wer hätte damals gedacht, dass wir beinahe dreissig Jahre später wegen des ehemaligen US-Präsidenten George Bush und des früheren britischen Premiers Tony Blair im selben Soldatengrab landen würden? Oder dass ein junger schwarzer US-Präsident genau dieselben Fehler machen würde wie damals die Russen?

In den Wochen nach ihrem Einmarsch in Afghanistan an Weihnachten 1979 beobachtete ich die Sowjetarmee bei ihrem «staged surge», ihrem inszenierten Befreiungszug. Ich sah, wie sie Kabul und die grössten afghanischen Städte einnahm, aber die riesigen Berg- und weiten Wüstengebiete den «Terroristen» überliess. Die Sowjetarmee kündigte an, die afghanische Armee ausbilden zu wollen, und beharrte darauf, eine säkulare, nichtkorrupte Regierung stützen zu können und so der Bevölkerung Sicherheit zu bieten. Klingt das vertraut?

Langer, langer Krieg

Victor Sebestyen, Autor eines Buchs über den Fall des Sowjetimperiums, hat viel über die Zeit kurz nach dem Einmarsch der sowjetischen Armee geschrieben. Dabei zitierte er auch aus der Rede, die General Sergei Achromejew, damals Kommandant der sowjetischen Streitkräfte, 1986 vor dem sowjetischen Politbüro hielt: «Jeder Fussbreit Land in Afghanistan war irgendwann von unseren Soldaten besetzt. Trotzdem bleibt ein grosser Teil des Gebiets in den Händen der Terroristen. Wir kontrollieren die Provinzzentren, aber wir können die Kontrolle über die eroberten Gebiete nicht behaupten.»

Sebestyen schreibt auch, dass Achromejew damals zusätzliche Truppen verlangte – ohne die der Krieg in Afghanistan noch «sehr, sehr lange» dauern würde. Klingt das vertraut? «Unsere Soldaten trifft keine Verantwortung. Sie haben unter schwersten Umständen unglaublich tapfer gekämpft. Aber in einem so weitläufigen Land, in dem die Widerstandskämpfer jederzeit in den Bergen untertauchen können, bringt es wenig, Städte und Dörfer nur kurzfristig zu besetzen.» Diese Aussage von Achromejew könnte genauso gut von einem US-amerikanischen oder britischen Kommandanten der heutigen Besatzungstruppen in Helmand stammen.

Ich habe zugesehen, wie die Tragödie in diesen trostlosen Monaten des Frühjahrs 1980 ihren Lauf nahm. In Kandahar skandierten die Menschen «Allahu akbar» von den Dächern ihrer Häuser und auf den Strassen ausserhalb der Stadt. Ich sprach mit Widerstandskämpfern der Mudschaheddin, den Taliban jener Zeit, die die sowjetischen Konvois bombardierten. Nördlich von Dschalalabad hielten sie gar einmal meinen Bus an. In den Mündungen ihrer Kalaschnikows steckten rote Rosen. Sie holten kommunistische StudentInnen aus dem Fahrzeug, und ich wagte es nicht, mir über deren weiteres Schicksal Gedanken zu machen. Es wird sich kaum von jenem unterschieden haben, das regierungsfreundlichen afghanischen StudentInnen droht, wenn sie heute den Taliban in die Hände fallen. Kurz zuvor hatten die Mudschaheddin – die «Lieblingsfreiheitskämpfer» des damaligen US-Präsidenten Ronald Rea­gan – eine Schule zerstört, weil dort auch Mädchen ausgebildet worden waren. Die verbrannten Leichen des Schulvorstehers und seiner Frau baumelten an einem Baum.

Und schon damals erzählten auch die AfghanInnen die wildesten Geschichten: So wurden politische Gefangene heimlich aus dem Land geschafft und in der Sowjetunion gefoltert. Klingt das vertraut?

Leere Versprechen

In Kandahar hatte mich ein Ladenbesitzer auf der Strasse angesprochen, ein gebildeter Mann um die fünfzig, der einen Pullover nach europäischer Mode und einen afghanischen Turban trug. Ich besitze noch immer meine Gesprächsnotizen. «Jeden Tag verspricht uns die Regierung, dass die Lebensmittelpreise sinken werden», erzählte der Mann. «Jeden Tag versuchen sie uns weiszumachen, dass nun dank der Sowjetunion alles besser werde. Aber das ist nicht wahr.» Die Regierung sei nicht einmal in der Lage, die Strassen zu kontrollieren. «Sie kann sich nur in den Städten halten.» Die Mudschaheddin, sagte der Mann, würden Helmand heimsuchen und sich völlig frei über die pakistanische Grenze bewegen – genau wie die Taliban heute.

Und vielleicht sollte jemand einmal den jungen US-SoldatInnen, die die Drohnen kontrollieren, die heute regelmässig in Pakistan Angriffe fliegen, ein paar vertraute Geschichten erzählen: etwa die von Anang 1980, als ein sowjetischer Kampfjet über pakistanisches Gebiet flog, um dort die Guerilla anzugreifen, und wie die pakistanische – und natürlich auch die US-amerikani­sche – Regierung das als eklatante Verletzung der pakistanischen Souveränität verurteilten. Oder über das Schicksal früherer sowjetischer Soldaten, die ich vor einigen Jahren in Moskau traf und von denen viele inzwischen den Drogen verfallen sind oder die bis heute unter einer posttraumatischen Belastungsstörung durch ihre Kriegserlebnisse leiden.

Kabul 30 years ago, and Kabul today. Have we learned nothing?

Robert Fisk: 'Terrorists' were in Soviet sights; now they are in the Americans'.

I sit on the rooftop of the old Central Hotel – pharaonic-decorated elevator, unspeakable apple juice, sublime green tea, and armed Tajik guards at the front door – and look out across the smoky red of the Kabul evening. The Bala Hissar fort glows in the dusk, massive portals, the great keep to which the British army should have moved its men in 1841. Instead, they felt the king should live there and humbly built a cantonment on the undefended plain, thus leading to a "signal catastrophe".

Like automated birds, the kites swoop over the rooftops. Yes, the kite-runners of Kabul, minus Hollywood. At night, the thump of American Sikorsky helicopters and the whisper of high-altitude F-18s invade my room. The United States of America is settling George Bush's scores with the "terrorists" trying to overthrow Hamid Karzai's corrupt government.

Now rewind almost 29 years, and I am on the balcony of the Intercontinental Hotel on the other side of this great, cold, fuggy city. Impeccable staff, frozen Polish beer in the bar, secret policemen in the front lobby, Russian troops parked in the forecourt. The Bala Hissar fort glimmers through the smoke. The kites – green seems a favourite colour – move beyond the trees. At night, the thump of Hind choppers and the whisper of high-altitude MiGs invade my room. The Soviet Union is settling Leonid Brezhnev's scores with the "terrorists" trying to overthrow Barbrak Karmal's corrupt government.

Thirty miles north, all those years ago, a Soviet general told us of the imminent victory over the "terrorists" in the mountains, imperialist "remnants" – the phrase Kabul communist radio always used – who were being supported by America and Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.

Fast forward to 2001 – just seven years ago – and an American general told us of the imminent victory over the "terrorists" in the mountains, the all but conquered Taliban who were being supported by Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. The Russian was pontificating at the big Soviet airbase at Bagram. The American general was pontificating at the big US airbase at Bagram.

This is not déjà-vu. This is déjà double-vu. And it gets worse.

Almost 29 years ago, the Afghan "mujahedin" began a campaign to end the mixed schooling of boys and girls in the remote mountain passes, legislation pushed through by successive communist governments. Schools were burned down. Outside Jalalabad, I found a headmaster and his headmistress wife burned to death. Today, the Afghan Taliban are campaigning to end the mixed schooling of boys and girls – indeed the very education of young women – across the great deserts of Kandahar and Helmand. Schools have been burned down. Teachers have been executed.

As the Soviets began to suffer more and more casualties, their officers boasted of the increasing prowess of the Afghan National Army, the ANA. Infiltrated though they were by the "mujahedin", Moscow gave them newer tanks and helped to train new battalions to take on the guerrillas outside the capital.

Fast forward to now. As the Americans and British suffer ever greater casualties, their officers boast of the increasing prowess of the ANA. Infiltrated though they are by the Taliban, America and other Nato states are providing them with newer equipment and training new battalions to take on the guerrillas outside the capital. Back in January of 1980, I could take a bus from Kabul to Kandahar. Seven years later, the broken highway was haunted by "mujahedin" fighters and bandits and the only safe way to travel to Kandahar was by air.

In the immediate aftermath of America's arrival here in 2001, I could take a bus from Kabul to Kandahar. Now, seven years later, the highway – rebuilt on the express instructions of George W but already cracked and swamped with sand – is haunted by Taliban fighters and bandits and the only safe way to travel to Kandahar is by air.

Throughout the 1980s, the Soviets and the ANA held the towns but lost most of the country. Today, America and its allies and the ANA hold most of the towns but have lost the southern half of the country. The Soviets secretly sent another 9,000 troops to join their 115,000-strong occupation force to fight the "mujahedin". Today, the Americans are publicly sending another 7,000 troops to join their 55,000-strong occupation force to fight the Taliban.

In 1980, I would sneak down to Chicken Street to buy old books in the dust-filled shops, cheap and illegal Pakistani reprints of the memoirs of British Empire officers while my driver watched anxiously lest I be mistaken for a Russian. Last week, I sneaked down to the Shar Book shop, which is filled with the very same illicit volumes, while my driver watched anxiously lest I be mistaken for an American (or, indeed, a Brit). I find Stephen Tanner's Afghanistan: A Military History From Alexander The Great To The Fall Of The Taliban and drive back to my hotel through the streets of wood-smoked Kabul to read it in my ill-lit room.

In 1840, Tanner writes, Britain's supply line from the Pakistani city of Karachi up through the Khyber Pass and Jalalabad to Kabul was being threatened by Afghan fighters, "British officers on the crucial supply line through Peshawar... insulted and attacked". I fumble through my bag for a clipping from a recent copy of Le Monde. It marks Nato's main supply route from the Pakistani city of Karachi up through the Khyber Pass and Jalalabad to Kabul, and illustrates the location of each Taliban attack on the convoys bringing fuel and food to America's allies in Afghanistan.

Then I prowl through one of the Pakistani retread books I have found and discover General Roberts of Kandahar telling the British in 1880 that "we have nothing to fear from Afghanistan, and the best thing to do is to leave it as much as possible to itself... I feel sure I am right when I say that the less the Afghans see of us, the less they will dislike us".

Memo to the Americans, the Brits, the Canadians and the rest of Humpty Dumpty's men. Read Roberts. Read history.

Israel seems to become more and more horrible each day

Yaron London is one of the most beloved and popular media personalities in Israel; a journalist for mainstream radio, TV and printed press; and an actor and songwriter. He has co-hosted numerous children's shows on TV as well as producing films and events. His daily current affairs program "London & Kirschenbaum" on Israeli TV Channel Ten is well known and popular.

Considered a political moderate, in recent years his positions have shifted to the right, reflecting trends in the Israeli mainstream public at large.

He has an opinion column on Israel's most popular news website, YNet, of which the most recent is below. The highlighting of the key passage was not in the original.

The victory of cruelty

A year after Gaza offensive, Yaron London says Israel must not aim to satisfy global public opinion

Yaron London, Ynetnews Opinion, 29.12.09

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3826286,00.html

A year has passed since Operation Cast Lead. The Gaza vicinity region is calm and prosperous. Residents who left for fear of Qassams are returning home. Apartment prices are increasing. Even nature is blossoming. The blessed rain of the beginning of winter has woken the sleepy seeds of wild flowers. The soft hills of the "vicinity" have been speckled with yellow and red patches. It's possible that this is what these landscapes looked like last year as well, but no one was gazing at them, but rather westward, to locate a rising missile and precede its diving fall by taking shelter.

Hamas is deterred. Not because its leaders and the teachers of Islamic law have changed their opinion as to the way the conflict in the Middle East should be solved. Our monitors, who listen to the preaching in their mosques and to the radio broadcasts on their stations, have not discovered signs of moderation. As they did before the operation, the preachers talk about the Jews, the descendants of apes and pigs, who spread wars and epidemics and heresy and communism in the world, and that they must be expelled from the this world. Hamas fighters have not lost their courage. They are as fanatic and daring as they were. The virgins waiting for them in heaven have not lost their patience as well.

Hamas refrains from firing because it needs a timeout in order to establish its rule, rebuild the destructed houses, intensify its military power and fulfill the Shalit deal. When its leaders feel that they have completed their missions, when they believe the time is right, they'll resume their attacks. And maybe not. Perhaps they have learned their lesson. In any event, we cannot doubt the assertion that had we not sent a blow of fire to Gaza, Hamas would have continued firing.

It doesn't pay to wait

We're enjoying a state of calm which is seldom violated. What was its price? The price was 10 fallen soldiers and more than 300 injured Israelis. There is no way to weigh this loss. The world has worsened its criticism against Israel. It's unpleasant, completely unpleasant, to face boycotts and curses, but the stains added to our image have not damaged us in measurable areas. The economy is good. The commerce relations have not been hurt. The countries leading the world – the United States, Russia, the European community, China, India, Canada, Brazil – have not changed their attitude towards us. They have not even compensated the Hamas regime for the suffering of the Strip's residents. Egypt has tightened its relations with us. Saudi Arabia has rebuked Hamas and has not adopted the Gazans with money. The Palestinians in the West Bank have not launched a third intifada. For now. Turkey, with which we have always had unstable relations, was angry and cursed us, but a year later it is clear that its interests have cooled the growling of its feelings. Venezuela, Bolivia, Mauritania and Qatar have severed their diplomatic ties with Israel. It's a shame, but not a disaster.

The operation's results are the victory of cruelty. It's unfortunate. It's brings us back to reality. It calls for conclusions. As time passes, the world, which as a short memory, will forget the harsh sights in Gaza, because more difficult sights, in other places in the world, will take up all the free space in the collective mind's hard drive. The Gazans will be the only ones to remember. If we are proven false, we must arouse their memory with fire.

We must not return to the absorption strategy, which is aimed at collecting credit points in the international public opinion. It has been proven that our stock of points runs out several days after we deal our enemies a critical blow. It doesn't pay to wait. We will have to impose the disproportionate response quickly, even if the rocket interception measures are not fully developed by then. "Deterrence", as security experts say, "must be maintained." To this statement we should add that the determination of the deterrence maintainers must also be maintained.
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Are the people just going insane or is this a "sane" choice of fascism? With those minds there is no hope only bloodshed and killing...

TAC Press Statement

3 December 2009

TAC commends President Zuma for his leadership on HIV and welcomes the death of AIDS denialism

Following on other important speeches in recent months, President Zuma’s World AIDS Day address reaffirmed government’s new-found commitment to fighting HIV/AIDS in an open, serious, and evidence-based manner. TAC welcomes the president’s call for people to get tested and his public admission of having taken HIV tests himself.

Some key changes announced by the president include:

1) Providing ART to all people co-infected with TB/HIV at a CD4-count of 350.

While we welcome the decision to initiate treatment for all people co-infected with HIV and TB with a CD4 count of 350 cells/mm3 or lower, TAC will continue to campaign for the provision of treatment to all HIV-positive people with a CD4 count of 350 cells/mm3 or lower irrespective of their TB status. This is in accordance with World Health Organisation recommendations.

2) Providing all infants under 12 months with antiretroviral treatment (ART)

TAC welcomes the changes made to the paediatric treatment guidelines. Following the compelling findings of the Children with HIV Early Treatment study, TAC has been campaigning for the provision of antiretroviral treatment for all infants under one year of age.

3) Providing pregnant women with CD4 counts above 350 with prevention
of mother-to-child treatment from 14 weeks.

The changes to the PMTCT regimen indicate government's commitment to eradicating new paediatric infections. However, in addition to improving the prenatal regimen, policy improvements are also needed for postpartum vertical transmission. Various options are possible here which TAC will address in more detail in a PMTCT briefing that we will release early in 2010.

While we welcome the new guidelines, they do not address the urgent need to update the current first-line treatment regimen. TAC will continue to campaign to have tenofovir-based three-in-one once-daily pills introduced as part of the standard first-line regimen by July 2010.

As the new guidelines are implemented in facilities across the country it is critical to improve the monitoring and evaluation of both the HAART and PMTCT programmes. At a minimum we must aim for complete quarterly district-level information on the numbers of people initiated on these programmes, median baseline CD4 count, median change in CD4 count, number of people lost-to-follow-up, number of deaths and number of children born to HIV-positive women who have been tested.

President Zuma will face challenges ahead to ensure that these are not just changes to policy but are implemented in all facilities across the country. We call on government to strengthen health systems to implement the improved treatment guidelines.

TAC is committed to working with government to address capacity constraints to improve the response to HIV. TAC further supports government’s call for all South Africans to take responsibility for their own health and get tested and access treatment for HIV. Knowing your status will allow you to make informed decisions to protect your own health, the health of your sexual partner and the health of your baby.

ALUTA CONTINUA!

Help warn about AdSense

his week Google began recording the web surfing behavior of everyone who visits any page that uses AdSense or DoubleClick. It happens as soon as the page loads — no clicking is required. Their new doubleclick.net cookie has a unique ID and is similar to the same sophisticated system that was developed over the last ten years for the google.com cookie.

Many major sites use AdSense. It took me a minute to find AdSense on newyorktimes.com, reuters.com, bloomberg.com, and cnn.com, and then I stopped looking because my suspicions were already confirmed. Even apart from AdSense, DoubleClick ads are all over the web. Unless you disable JavaScript, which makes surfing inconvenient on many sites and impossible on some, you are getting thoroughly tracked.

This tracking is a major move on Google's part. The referral from the phone-home to doubleclick.net contains the complete URL of the page you are viewing. It happens in the same instant that your browser offers up the unique ID from your cookie. Google can add a time stamp and your IP address — and knowing Google, they will.

While Google says that it is dicing this information so that it can merely stick you into a number of broad interest categories, we have to assume that Google is saving all of the information they collect. It would not make sense to identify the relevant categories on the fly and then throw away the details. That would preclude future development into a more finely-grained system. Yes, we have to assume that Google saves everything, until such time that Google allows auditors into the Googleplex and the auditors say otherwise.

The biggest issue that ought to evolve out of this latest development is the issue of opt-in vs. opt-out. This new tracking should be opt-in, but Google is falling all over itself to make sure it stays opt-out. My guess is that opt-in might allow tracking of less than two percent of the activity that the current opt-out system will allow. How many people even know what a cookie is? What percentage know how to configure the cookie options on their browsers? If they delete their cookies just one time after opting out, will they remember that they also deleted their opt-out cookie, and that Google's tracking now resumes?

If this new Google initiative remains opt-out the way it is now, the FTC should require all sites that use AdSense, to intercept their page with a notice that allows a simple opt-out click for that page. But that is extremely clumsy and would crush AdSense altogether. Opt-in is the only reasonable alternative.

How to combine two cookies

( Google already knows this, but you might not )

1. On the Google home page, force the browser to fetch an invisible image or iframe from DoubleClick.

2. Overwrite the doubleclick.net cookie ID to match the google.com ID that was just recorded.

3. Keep it up until nearly all browsers show a Google ID in their DoubleClick cookie.

Conservatives Anti-Semitic Friend Declares his Undying Sympathy for Israel!

I May Not like Jews but I Just Love Israel

Michal Kaminski - friend of British Conservatism

The row over the Tory Party’s choice of allies in the European Parliament rumbles on. In particular over Michal Kaminiski, member of the far-right Law and Justice Party in Poland’s Sejm and leader of the Conservatives and Reformists Group in the European Parliament. Leaving aside Robert Zile’s Freedom and Fatherland Party in Latvia, which has a soft spot for all those Latvian SS men who helped round up the Jews.

What is interesting in this debate is how, BNP style, Kaminiski’s retort to the allegation of anti-Semitism is: ‘What me? But I support Israel.’ And that is precisely the problem. It reminds me of a quotation in Francis Nicosia’s new book, ‘anti-Semitism in Nazi Germany.’ [2008].

Nicosia is an American Professor of Political Science and an ardent Zionist who continually finds himself at odds with the evidence he uncovers. But despite his Zionism he notes that although today criticism of Zionism

‘is often dismissed as motivated by a deeper anti-Semitism, in Herzl’s day an opposite non-Jewish reaction, one of support for the Zionist idea, might have resulted in a similar reaction.’ [p.7]

His conclusion is that ‘Before the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948, active anti-Zionism… was largely a Jewish phenomenon…’ [13]

And that is precisely the point. If someone says that they believe Jews don’t belong in this country and should depart, then they are either an anti-semite or a Zionist or both. So it’s no surprise that Israel’s Ambassador to Britain, the intellectually challenged Ron Prossor, should be up there giving Kaminiski his full support. Likewise the Conservative Friends of Israel stand shoulder to shoulder with a man who has opposed any form of Polish apology for the massacre at Jedwabne (because Jews should apologise for the behaviour of the Soviet Union – understandable if you hold that Jews collectively were responsible for Stalin's atrocities or for Communism more generally, which is something Hitler certainly believed in.

Kaminski also paid homage to see General Pinochet when he was under house arrest in Britain, presenting him with some Catholic curiosity. Leaving aside of course his anti-gay credentials.

Now it may be, as some have argued, that Kaminski is more an opportunist than a fascist supporter. But regardless he makes a good bedfellow for both Israeli apologists and David Cameron. Interestingly, senior members of the Jewish Leadership Council have been spitting blood at the letter Vivian Wineman, President of the Board of Deputies of British Jews sent David Cameron asking, ever so politely, about his new far-right friends.

We are told that ‘One JLC member described colleagues as “livid” at the timing of the letter. Another said he was “incandescent”. A senior Jewish Conservative said: “The Board has done itself a lot of damage. It is acting naively, it has been manipulated by left-wing interests into a completely inappropriate position. The irony is that the new Tory European group will be the most pro-Israel lobby group.”

Of course this is no irony at all. I can once remember watching a programme featuring one Ian Paisley, leader of the Democratic Unionist Party in Northern Ireland. He littered his conversation with anti-Semitic epithets, but this man was as pro-Zionist as you could get.

What of course the unnamed senior Jewish conservative meant is that ‘anti-Semitism’ is only a stick to beat the left and those horrible Muslims around the head with. It’s not actually mean to be taken seriously, as in anti-Semitism, hatred of Jews. ‘Anti-Semitism’ is merely a form of defamation and libel to be used against anti-racists in the name of Israel’s war against the Palestinians. It is effectively the conscious and deliberate misuse of the memory of those who died in the Final Solution to bolster Israel and US imperialism.

Kaminski admits wearing 'fascist' symbol
By Martin Bright and Jessica Elgot, October 10, 2009

Michal KaminskI, the Polish MEP at the centre of the controversy over David Cameron’s European alliances has admitted he wore the symbol of a totalitarion group, claims he had previously denied.

In an interview with the JC, Mr Kaminski was asked if he had ever said he was proud to wear the Chrobry Sword, the symbol of the National Radical Camp (ONR).

Formed in 1934, the extreme rightwing, nationalist ONR- Falanga was largely a student movement, but practised violent anti-Semitism including attacks on Jewish students, buildings and businesses, organised boycotts of Jewish businesses and attacks on left wing groups.
The group used the medieval symbol of the Mieczyk Chrobrego – the Chrobry sword,

Mr KaminskI categorically denied knowledge of wearing the Chrobry sword symbol.
He told the JC: “No, I never wear it. I don’t even know which symbol you are referring to.”
But Mr Kaminski later issued a clarification, where he admitted he had worn the badge.
He said:

"I did wear the sword, which was used around a millennia ago to crown Polish Kings, on my lapel on occasions. After 1989 it was used as one of the symbols of the Christian National Union and many Conservative politicians would wear it, including politicians now in the Civic Platform.

“In recent years it has been taken as a symbol by the Far Right. Although it is not the same, there are similarities with how the BNP in Britain has taken the Union Jack as their symbol.
“When I felt the symbol started having this meaning I stopped wearing it and I asked the rest of my party to stop too.”

He added: “I acknowledge that it is possible that my pronunciation was unclear, so I am happy to clarify his position on this controversial symbol."

EXCLUSIVE Michal Kaminski: 'I'm no antisemite'

When I finally interview Michal Kaminski he is looking extremely flustered, not to say hounded, by the attention he has received during his flying visit to Conservative Party conference. The controversial leader of David Cameron’s new allies in the European Parliament has been chased into a fringe meeting by a woman from Channel 4 and to the doors of a lunch hosted by Conservative Friends of Israel. Allegations about his far-right past have quite literally pursued him to a suite at Manchester’s Midland Hotel.

Here it is that the 37-year-old head of the new European Conservatives and Reformists grouping has chosen to explain his controversial past statements, which range from the Holocaust and the role of Jewish partisans in the Soviet occupation, to General Pinochet and homosexuality.

In his only interview with a British newspaper, he says he welcomes the opportunity to reassure readers of the JC that he is no antisemite.“If you grew up in Poland, if you saw the traces of the Holocaust in my country, the accusation of being an antisemite is, I think, really hard,” he says. “Being an antisemite is something which is contradictory to all my beliefs, starting with my religious beliefs as a Christian and ending with my political conservative views.”

He adds that he considers that western civilisation is essentially Judeo-Christian and therefore “created to a big extent by Jews”.

Mr Kaminski says that he understands the concerns raised by some of the allegations against him. His colourful CV has already caused acute embarrassment to the Conservative Party and provided ammunition to those who say Cameron has rejected the mainstream centre-right in Europe in favour of a rag-tag bunch of apologists for fascism. At the same time, his robust support for Israel provides Anglo-Jews with a dilemma. His status as guest of honour at the CFI lunch demonstrates the level of trust he commands among leading Jewish Tories. His visit to Israel last month saw him welcomed by Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon.

But how does this square with Mr Kaminski’s political beginnings with the far-right National Revival of Poland party (NOP)? The party he joined as a teenager is said to have pledged that “Jews will be removed from Poland and their possessions confiscated”. His response is that he was just 15 when he joined the NOP in 1987 when it was still an underground movement. Two years later it merged into the mainstream Conservative Christian National Union. “It was for me the first available option to join the anti-Communist movement and when I was 17 I left this group,” he says, adding that there was no evidence of a neo-fascist tendency at the time. “When I was a member of them, I don’t remember. Maybe you will find that someone will… but as far as I know it was a party which was Catholic and nationalist-orientated.”

Mr Kaminski himself raises the issue of Jedwabne, a town in the north-east of Poland which was the site of a massacre of hundreds of its Jewish inhabitants in July 1941 by a mob of Poles. Sixty years later, the then Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski issued an apology for the atrocity, but the issue was hugely divisive. As the deputy in the Polish parliament responsible for the area, Mr Kaminski expressed his opposition to a generalised apology, a decision he stands by.

From the very beginning I was saying as a human being, as a Pole, that Jedwabne was a terrible crime, unfortunately committed by the Polish people. My point was from the very start: we are ashamed of these people, we have to condemn them, we have to judge them if they are still alive. But I don’t want to take the whole responsibility for this crime for the whole Polish nation.

He adds that he doesn’t believe the Jedwabne massacre should be classified on the same level as the Holocaust. “I think that it’s unfair comparing it with Nazi crimes and putting it with the same level as the Nazi policy.”

More difficult for Mr Kaminski (and potentially Mr Cameron) is the suggestion that the Polish politician claimed no apology should be made until Jews apologised for alleged Jewish crimes of collaboration with the Soviet Union. His answer is ingenious. He says that asking the Poles as a whole to apologise for Jedwabne would make as much sense as asking the Jews to apologise for alleged Jewish involvement in Communist crimes.It is a theme to which he returns later in the interview:

My position is that there were acts of collaboration of the Jewish people with the Soviet army when the Soviet army came to Poland. It’s a fact. It’s a historical fact… If you are asking the Polish nation to apologise for the crime made in Jedwabne, you would require from the whole Jewish nation to apologise for what some Jewish Communists did in Eastern Poland.

I ask him about an interview he gave to the ultra-nationalist Polish newspaper Nacza Polska at the time of the apology, when he is alleged to have said he would only apologise for Jedwabne when “someone from the Jewish side will apologise for what the Jews did during the Soviet occupation between 1939 and 1941, for the mass collaboration of the Jewish people with the Soviet occupier.” He claims he does not remember giving the interview. Does he recognise the words as his? “I absolutely do not recognise them. It was nine years ago.” He adds that official statements at the time made his position on the matter clear. I ask him about his use of the slogan “Poland is for the Poles”, which is said to have associations with pre-war Polish ultra-nationalism. He says he had been referring to Poland’s corruption scandals of 2000 when the new democracy was seriously under threat. “We have to give Poland to Poles but….not in a racial or nationalistic sense but in terms of democracy. We want to give back Polish democracy to the Poles, to the citizens.”

I ask him to clarify claims that he expressed pride in wearing the Chrobry sword, the symbol of the National Radical Camp Falanga, a Catholic totalitarian group formed in 1935. He issues a categorical denial: “No, I never wear it. I don’t even know which symbol you are referring to." [Mr Kaminski later clarified his position, claiming he had in fact worn the symbol]

There is no doubt there has been a concerted attempt by David Cameron’s political enemies to discredit Mr Kaminski. But there are areas of his own political biography where he admits he made serious errors of judgment. In 1999, he visited the Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet in London, an event he described as “the most important moment of my whole life”. He later made a statement to the Polish parliament saying he regretted his actions. He says: “I think I made a mistake visiting Pinochet. A decent politician should have the courage to admit the mistake”.

I wonder if he thinks it was also a mistake to have described homosexuals as “pedaly”, a derogatory term akin to “shirt-lifters”. Again he admits an error of judgement. “I said I would never use these words again. But please remember it was a word used commonly by Polish politicians about homosexuals. “Since I discovered that this word was offensive in the eyes of homosexuals, I never used it again.” As we end the interview he talks of his pride at heading up the new conservative grouping in the European parliament and his great respect for British Conservatism. But Mr Kaminski cannot have imagined that he would end up as such a controversial figure for the party that has inspired his politics for so long.

The creation of the ECR has been a huge risk for David Cameron, brought about because he needed to provide some “red meat” to the Eurosceptics in his party. In the final irony, though, it turns out that Mr Kaminski is himself an enthusiastic Europhile who has embraced the Lisbon Treaty so hated by the right-wing of the British Conservative Party. “I was on the side of those who were in favour of the Lisbon Treaty. It is well known in Poland. It is not a secret,” he says. I apologise that so much of the interview has been taken up by allegations from Mr Kaminski’s political enemies. To his credit he says that it has been important to answer his critics.

UPDATE: Mr Kaminski made the following statement to the JC on Friday:

I did wear the sword, which was used around a millennia ago to crown Polish Kings, on my lapel on occasions. After 1989 it was used as one of the symbols of the Christian National Union and many Conservative politicians would wear it, including politicians now in the Civic Platform. In recent years it has been taken as a symbol by the Far Right. Although it is not the same, there are similarities with how the BNP in Britainhas taken the Union Jack as their symbol. When I felt the symbol started having this meaning I stopped wearing it and I asked the rest of my party to stop too.

Analysis by Political Editor Martin Bright Editor Stephen Pollard

Once no self-respecting politician would have gone near people such as Kaminski

Conference season 09: There is plenty of ground to attack Cameron on, a man aligned with those who excuse or celebrate history's darkest events

Jonathan Freedland guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 6 October 2009 20.30 BST

Tony Blair's parting gift during his last conference speech as leader was to tell Labour they could win again because the Conservatives were eminently beatable. "If we can't take this lot apart," he said, "we shouldn't be in the business of politics at all."

Of course, it was a double-edged remark, one that pre-emptively branded his successor a failure. But, in its implication that David Cameron's Tories were a bunch of weaklings, it was also unfair. For the Conservatives on display in Manchester are anything but. They are, in fact, marching towards power, acting in every way like a government in waiting. The ruling circle is confident, whip-smart and, above all, hungry.

The contrast with their counterparts in Labour could not be sharper. When they gathered in Brighton last week, too many of the party's most senior figures came across as flabby, too used to power and its comforts, delusional, kidding themselves that their leader might undergo a personality change between now and the election, or utterly resigned, all fight drained from them.

The clearest sign is that the once-feared New Labour attack machine now stands unmanned and rusted with decay. Tory missteps and gaffes go ignored and unpunished, where, in the Alastair Campbell era of rapid rebuttal, they would have been seized on ruthlessly.

Which is a pity, because the Tories, while not exactly the useless shower suggested by Blair, are certainly vulnerable. If Labour were in fighting mood, there is no shortage of weak spots on the Conservative flank at which they could aim their darts.

They might start with the polls. Not with the headline figure, which shows a daunting Tory lead, but with the rest of the data. According to Populus, 68% don't believe the Conservatives have really changed, while only 28% believe they have. They may like David Cameron personally, but they harbour suspicions about the Tories themselves.

Perhaps that doesn't matter much in our quasi-presidential system. But it's clearly preying on the minds of senior Tories. They say that one of their aims this week is to persuade voters that, yes, they'll be cutting spending, but it "won't be 1980s-style cuts". Hence George Osborne's insistence that, when he wields the scythe through the national budget, he'll always have the poorest in mind. "We're all in this together" was his happy tune.

That suggests a man anxious to deflect unhappy memories – a tactic Labour should be doing its damnedest to thwart. They have the perfect weapon, in the form of the Tory pledge to scrap inheritance tax for the wealthiest, a move that will benefit the likes of Osborne and Cameron but not many others.

Just imagine what a US presidential campaign would do with this ammunition. You could run an ad showing the Tory duo in their Bullingdon tails, reminding voters of their personal wealth, and asking how these two could ever be in touch with real people. You might show a man on a bike, later revealed to be followed by a car. The screen would fill with three words: "David Cameron: fake."

But the ad any American politico worth his salt would be itching to make would open thus. "They say you can judge a man by the company he keeps. So what does it say about David Cameron that these are his friends?" At which point we'd see images of the men feted in Manchester yesterday, Michal Kaminski, of Poland's Law and Order party (PiS), and Roberts Zile, of Latvia's Freedom and Fatherland party, who now sit as allies with the British Conservatives in the European parliament – an issue raised first, to his enormous credit, by David Miliband last week.

This is about more than party point-scoring. It is, in fact, a matter of the deepest principle. For there was a time when no self-respecting British politician would have gone anywhere near such people. Kaminski began his career in the National Rebirth of Poland movement, inspired by a 1930s fascist ideology that dreamed of a racially pure nation. Even today, the PiS slogan is "Poland for Poles", understood to be a door slammed in the face of non-Catholics. In 2001 he upbraided the president for daring to apologise for a 1941 pogrom in the town of Jedwabne which left hundreds of Jews dead. Kaminski said there was nothing to apologise for – at least not until Jews apologised for what he alleged was the role Jewish partisans and Jewish communists had played alongside the Red Army in Poland.

Incredibly, Kaminski's Polish party is not the most unsavoury of the Tories' new partners. That honour goes to the Latvian grouping whose members have played a leading part in the annual parade honouring veterans of the Latvian Legion of the Waffen-SS. Lest we forget, the SS were the crack troops of Nazi genocide; the Latvian Legion included conscripts, but at least a third were volunteers, among them men with the blood of tens of thousands of Jews on their hands. It is in honour of those killers that Cameron's new buddies march through the streets of Riga.

The Tory defence has been weak. They have cited the embrace extended to Kaminski by first, the editor of the Jewish Chronicle, and second, the Conservative Friends of Israel, which astonishingly welcomed Kaminski yesterday. What Tories do not point out is that the former is now a fierce anti-Brown partisan while the latter is, as the name suggests, wholly aligned with the Conservatives. Of course they are defending Cameron's decision. And both have spoken chiefly about Kaminski, suggesting a reluctance to defend the Latvian party. Besides, the president of the Board of Deputies of British Jews has now written to Cameron, raising questions about the Tory leader's new friends in Europe.

The party chairman, Eric Pickles, offered an appalling defence, telling the BBC last month that the Latvian Waffen-SS were only conscripts fighting for their country, and to say otherwise was a Soviet smear. Again, this misses the fact that a substantial minority of the Latvian Waffen-SS were eager volunteers, including veterans of pro-Nazi death squads who had already taken part in the first phase of the Holocaust – and that should be enough to decide that those who march in celebration of men who fought with Hitler, and against Britain and its allies, are beyond the pale.

The talk coming from senior Tories – at least some of whom have the grace to squirm when questioned on this topic – suggesting that it's all terribly complicated, that it was a long time ago and that even SS members were, in some ways, themselves victims, is uncomfortably close to the kind of prattle we used to hear from those we called Holocaust revisionists.

They too tried to relativise away the crimes of the Nazi era, constantly telling us that the Soviets also did terrible things, that Hitler's eastern European collaborators were freedom-loving patriots and all the rest of it. What is shocking is that this garbage is now coming from those defending the party poised to form the government of Britain.

So yes, there is plenty of ground on which to attack Cameron, a man whose judgment allowed him to placate his Eurosceptics by aligning with people who excuse or celebrate some of the darkest events of the last century. Labour might not have much vim left, but if it can't sustain an attack on this terrain, then maybe Blair was right, and they should not be in politics at all.