WHAT NEXT?

Nearly five years after the "axis of evil" speech, the thing that continues to annoy is how President Bush, prime minister Blair and now Israeli spokesmen claim to be the ones who are opposing terrorism. Anyone who does not support them, they suggest, is soft and permissive of Osama bin Laden and copy-cat gangs of violent fundamentalists.

If I had a great deal of money, I would take Bush and Blair to court for aiding and abetting terrorism. They were warned that their so-called "war on terrorism" would make things worse. And it has. It makes them fellow perpetrators of the current disasters.

At the start of the Lebanon conflict I noticed that an Israeli general had said on television that Israel would turn back the clock twenty years in Lebanon. I thought: "this guy is threatening collective punishment on an entire nation for a guerrilla incident!" It is the kind of outrageous thing retired generals say. I was confident he would be officially repudiated and told to zip his mouth. But no, it turns out he was Lieutenant-General Dan Halutz, the chief-of-staff directly in charge of the campaign that aerially bombed power-stations, water-plants and factories. One definition of terrorism is precisely that it attempts to deliver collective punishment.

The word "disproportionate" is code for a deep revulsion over such behaviour – behaviour which seems to allow Israel to believe it has the right to impose on any society which touches or challenges what it has already imposed upon Palestine.

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