NEWS AND VIEWS:

VIEWS: JEWISH AMBASSADOR LYMAN AND SUDAN’S PARTITION

I would like to add Ambassador Princeton Lyman, President Obama’s envoy to Sudan, to my list of “Washington Jewish Leaders” (WJL). I started the list few years ago after more than 30 years of covering Washington politics, especially foreign policy and especially the Jewish influence on policies towards Muslims and Arabs.

Few years after the 2003 US invasion of Iraq, I have come to believe that former President George W. Bush’s so-called “war on terrorism” is but a subtle and indirect war against Muslims (if not Islam), and that the WJL have had a major input. Few years ago, I picked Senator Joe Lieberman as the group leader.

Two cautionary points: (a) I say “influence,” not “control”; (b) don’t use “conspiracy” or “clique”; and (c) despite differences in opinions, I applaud their commitment and hard work.

I don’t have evidence that Ambassador Lyman “conspired” to partition Sudan, but, being part of the WJL, I believe he has “influenced” the partition.

1. “Jewish World Review”:”In the early summer of 1984, Tegegne and I went together to Washington to meet with members of Congress, their staffers and senior State Department officials. One of those officials, Princeton Lyman, was brought to tears by Tegegne’s description of the persecution that Ethiopian Jews were suffering and by my insistence that, especially because of its failure to rescue Jews during the Holocaust, America’s government was now morally bound to save Ethiopian Jews… Five months later, Lyman would play a key role in Operation Moses, the massive 1984 American and Israeli rescue of Ethiopian Jews.”

2. American Jewish World Service President Ruth Messinger: “He has an enormous task particularly with negotiations occurring immediately that will shape the future of relations between Sudan and Southern Sudan.”

3. Jewish Council for Public Affairs: “We congratulate Ambassador Princeton Lyman on his appointment to serve as the new Special Envoy for Sudan, and thank President Obama for his wise choice. After the successful and peaceful election last summer, it is crucial that we not let our focus on Sudan diminish.”

4. Florida Atlantic University: “Dr. Stanford M. Lyman Renowned FAU Scholar Dies At 69. As a boy, Stanford Lyman was stunned by the power of the ethnic hatred and discrimination that ravaged his Jewish relatives in Europe… In 1988, he visited three West African nations, presenting a joint lecture with the United States ambassador to Nigeria, Dr. Princeton Lyman, his younger brother.”

5. Jonathan Broder, “Salon”‘s Washington correspondent: “…: And for the first time in the State Department’s 208-year history, Jews lead the list of contenders for the six regional assistant secretary posts. According to well informed sources, they are: Mark Grossman, currently U.S. ambassador to Turkey, for assistant secretary for European affairs; Princeton Lyman, ambassador to Nigeria.”

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NEWS: STATE DEPARTMENT: TWO NEW SUDANS: PRINCETON LYMAN (Excerpts):

NEWS AND VIEWS:

VIEWS: SOMALI “TERRORISTS” MIGHT HAVE READ THE KORAN

“What is Terrorism?” and “What is Islam” are my two questions in my “Silent Jihad at the White House.”

Today, “The Washington Post” published a top-front-page-and-three-pages-with-many-large-photos piece about “terrorism” among the Somali Americans in Minnesota. “The Post” didn’t bother to ask “What is Terrorism?” or “What is Islam?”

“The Post” used the US government’s definition of “terrorism” and the new thread: “domestic terrorism” which now seems to be mostly about Somali Americans. Officials and Muslim leaders were interviewed; particularly Muslim leaders who are now helping the government to “brainwash” Somali “terrorists” who had been “brainwashed” by Al-Shabab which has “links” to Al Qaeda.

The implication is that these young Americans have “links” to Al Qaeda.

Is Al-Shabab a terrorist organization? “What is terrorism?”

Thanks to Prof. David Shinn, of George Washington University, who said last week in a Congressional hearing: “There is a debate among those of us who follow Somalia closely concerning the wisdom of the international community, including the United States, engaging al-Shabaab in a dialogue.”

My second point: “What is Islam?” The Koran, clearly and repeatedly, calls upon Muslims to fight against injustice, scarifying with their time, money, family and – best of all – lives.

Could it be that these Somali Americans read the Koran, and were not “brainwashed”?

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NEWS: LURE OF TERRORISM IN MINNESOTA:”WASHINGON POST” (Excerpts):

MINNEAPOLIS —… Abdirizak Bihi is the founder, director and sole employee of a community-based counterterrorism program. (But, he wondered whether the problem had grown too big for him. “More kids become terrorists, more families are broken, and nothing ever changes,” he said…

There have been 51 homegrown jihadist plots or attacks in the United States since Sept. 11, 2001, according to law enforcement reports, and their frequency is increasing. Nowhere else is the problem of radicalization so concentrated as in Bihi’s section of downtown Minneapolis, where about 10,000 Somali immigrants live in a collection of faded apartment towers bordering the freeway…

At least 25 young men have disappeared from here to fight for al-Shabab in the past three years, and dozens more are being investigated on suspicion of recruiting or fundraising on behalf of the terrorist organization…

Many mosques, elected officials and even law enforcement agencies have hesitated to address the radicalization of a small percentage of American Muslims, because the topic itself is so divisive.

The focus on homegrown jihad is considered:

(a)
the next front in the war on terrorism, or

(b)
an Islamophobic witch hunt sure to create more ill will.

“There are no answers here, only more questions,” Bihi said. “Sometimes this work feels hopeless, like trying to drain the ocean”…

Despite four congressional hearings and dozens of meetings, the U.S. government has yet to reach a consensus on how, exactly, counter-radicalization should work:

(a)Some Democrats argue that focusing on Muslim extremism alone is discriminatory.

(b)Some Republicans argue that the country’s security leaves no room for political correctness…

The few de-radicalization programs that exist are untested and disparate:

(a)
Mohamed Elibiary, a self-described “master of the last-ditch save” from Texas who helps law enforcement agencies de-radicalize known extremists.

(b)
Imad Hamad, who runs a monthly program in Dearborn, Mich., that brings together imams and FBI agents.

(c)
The Muslim Public Affairs Council, which sponsors trips for teenagers to Hollywood so they can learn about a quintessentially American place often demonized by Islamist groups…

The FBI describes a “vulnerable community”: More than half of households are headed by single mothers, 70 percent of families live in poverty and almost 25 percent of adults are unemployed…

In Bihi’s e-mail, there was one piece of information — enough by itself to send a chill down his spine and remind him, he said, that “a few radicals are hijacking and distorting” his beloved faith. The suicide bomber’s work had been summarized in two words: “Employer: Islam.”

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NEWS AND VIEWS:

VIEWS: THE CHRISTIAN WEST AND SUDAN

This time, “The New York Times” said it: “Sudan has been an obsession for the West for more than 100 years.”

(Read below).

Two weeks ago, I sent an opinion on South Sudan to major US newspapers; the only reply I received was from the op-ed editor of “The Washington Post”: “I do not think this column is right for our op-ed page, but it makes an interesting point about the media coverage.”

I wondered what “right” meant, but, being a journalist, I resigned to the decision and hoped for a better chance in the future.

Here are the first two paragraphs of my opinion:

“The debate about Sudan has been mainly about slavery, racial discrimination, ethnic cleansing, civil wars, military regimes, oil and terrorism, but not much about the most important – though subtle – factor: the centuries-old slow spread of Islam.

Where I was born, in a village on the River Nile, south of the borders with Egypt, I saw remnants of churches that were left from a dominant Christian kingdom, about a thousand year ago. When I moved about 300 miles south to Khartoum, capital of Sudan, I saw remnants of churches that were left from another dominant Christian kingdom, about 500 years ago. When I travelled about 700 miles to the south, to Juba, capital of South Sudan, I saw many mosques…”

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NEWS: “NEW YORK TIMES”: JEFFREY GETTLEMAN: SOUTH SUDAN SECURED (Excerpts):

JUBA, Sudan — on the desk in his office in Juba, the capital of the world’s newest country, R. Barrie Walkley, the American consul general, has a telling picture. It is of him and George Clooney shaking hands in a crowd during the independence referendum here in southern Sudan in January.

The photograph offers a unique window into what is happening now. American celebrities and religious groups teamed up with policy makers and helped a forlorn underdog region finally achieve what very few separatist movements achieve: independence…

Sudan has been an obsession for the West for more than 100 years, and it is an interesting question why, of all the world’s war zones and all the blood baths Africa has witnessed — Liberia, Somalia, Congo, to name a few — this place has grabbed so much attention…

John Voll, a professor of Islamic history at Georgetown University, said Sudan’s internal conflicts were easily reduced by outsiders to Manichaean absolutes of oppressed Africans, many of them Christians, getting crushed by Arabs, “with echoes of the Crusades.”

Sudan has an unusually clear fault line, reinforced by the British colonizers; … Western missionaries began to champion the southern Sudanese cause…

“Long before there was such a thing as secular human rights groups or a United Nations, missionaries rallied behind Sudan’s suffering,” said Eliza Griswold, author of “The Tenth Parallel,” a book on the line of latitude that roughly separates the Muslim and Christian worlds in Africa and Asia…

In 2001, Christian groups found a friend in the White House. The administration of George W. Bush pushed southern rebels, who had been fighting for self-determination for decades, and Sudan’s central government to sign a peace agreement in 2005, which guaranteed the southerners the right to secede…

During the South independence festivities, American religious groups were represented. The only non-government employee in President Obama’s official delegation to Juba besides Mr. Powell was Ken Hackett, president of Catholic Relief Services.

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NEWS AND VIEWS:

VIEWS: STARBUCKS: THE QUITE AMERICANS

I am entering my fourth decade in America, but I am still learning some basics, like how the Americans worship quietness. Of course, New York City is very noisy and so are Cairo, Calcutta and cities almost everywhere. But, for 31 years I have been using the Washington, DC, subway system and I have been amazed at how relatively quite it is during rush hours.

I found that Christianity — its spirit, if not the established religion – is a major cause, especially after I participated in glasses in meditation, and centering and contemplative prayers. Because of my background, I know the importance of quietness in Sufism. Of course, life in my village was very quiet, but I have found that the real quietness is the one that challenges urban crowds, noise, rush – and rudeness.

But, cities in the West tend to be quieter than those in the East. I have been to cafes in Cairo and to Starbucks in Washington, and found a wide difference is the levels of quietness.

I found more quietness in Starbucks stores near where I live, in Burke, VA, a suburb of Washington. I sometimes look in amazement at people silently standing on line, crossing their arms and avoiding eye contacts.

That was why I found it interesting that immigrants from the Third Word felt unwelcomed when a Starbucks store removed the outside chairs they used to sit on with their coffees and talk.

(Read below).

Most probably, they used to enjoy the outside seating to avoid the inside quietness, and they must have had their share of silent looks that could be translated to “Shut up!”

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NEWS: RUMORS FLY AT VA. STARBUCKS: “WASHINGTON POST”:

(Excerpts): The regulars showed up as usual at the Falls Church Starbucks one day in late June, ready to share coffee and conversation with fellow immigrants from the Middle East and North Africa. But the men were stunned to find that the coffee chain, an integral part of their daily routine, had removed the outdoor seating that was central to their gatherings…

A Fairfax County official said the store lacked the correct permitting for outdoor seating…

The immigrants had begun gathering there in 1997, a year after the coffee chain opened in the Crossroads Place strip mall. They lingered over coffee to discuss politics, sports and life. They dispensed advice to newcomers and even dug into their pockets to help each other out during crises…

The immigrants were confounded… Jesse Foster, the store’s manager, said he hopes the men will return once the permit issue is resolved. In the meantime, he spends most of his time these days dispelling rumors — that the chairs were removed in retaliation… or that their removal was an attempt by Starbucks to reduce the crowds and change the scene…

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NEWS AND VIEWS:

VIEWS: “PEACE PENTAGON.” THREE CHEERS FOR LAURA GEORGE

Of course the US military just follows the Congress and the White House rules. Since 9/11/2001 attacks, the military enthusiastically implemented the so-called “war on terrorism” that was declared, with support from the Congress, by former President George W. Bush.

Few years after the 2003 invasion of Iraq, I have come to believe that the so-called “war on terrorism” is but a subtle and indirect war on Muslims (if not on Islam). Therefore, I have come to hold the Pentagon responsible for the killing of about 258,000 Muslims, according to a recent Brown University’s report.

I would like to add the following:

First, although the report didn’t specify religion, I would want to have it clearly and repeatedly specified. I believe about a thousand Christians were killed (mostly in Iraq), also a few Jews (like journalist Daniel Pearl who was beheaded in Pakistan).

Second, although the report didn’t say the US military was responsible for the killing of all the 258,000, I would want to believe it was. Most of the Muslim-on-Muslim killing wouldn’t have happen if the US didn’t intervene militarily (or didn’t diplomatically pressure the Muslims not to fight each other).

Because I will forever hold the Pentagon responsible, I was interested in the “Peace Pentagon” project by activist Laura George.

(Read below).

Laura George project is different from my “Silent Jihad at the White House,” but, it shows me:

First, that people can stand for what is just in a variety of ways.

Second, that I am not alone, shouldn’t despair and should continue my White House vigil, “UNTIL I DIE1″

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NEWS: INTERFATIH RETREAT TESTS FOUNDER, COMMUNITY: “THE WASHINGTON POST”

(Excerpts): INDEPENDENCE, Va. — In a clearing on a hill along a curve of the New River where apple trees bloom, Laura George wants to build a place for people of all faiths to gather in spiritual harmony… a “Peace Pentagon” spiritual education center, public library and 10 cabins for guests…

Just one problem: Most people around here don’t seem to want any part of it…

It’s clearly a violation of the First Amendment, said John W. Whitehead, president of the Rutherford Institute, a Virginia-based civil liberties group that is helping George. “There’s just a lot of hate out there. The fear that someone like this coming into the county with 10 cabins on the water is going to do something dramatic to the community . . . this is part of the religious wars we’re seeing, no doubt about that,” he said…

Grayson County has about 150 churches, about one for every 100 people… There are no synagogues, no mosques. One Muslim family worships secretly in its basement.

George was a lawyer in Leesburg (VA) when the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks occurred. They shook her up. “I saw what was coming — what is here now — is what we call a great cusp . . . a period of turmoil which precedes a major paradigm shift,” she said at home. Sept. 11 “is a symptom of a larger conflict going on spiritually around the globe,” she added…

Eddie Roland, pastor of Brush Creek Baptist Church, stood up at the meeting with his Bible in hand and said the proposed center “stands against the word of God. I believe it’s contradictory to it. I believe it’s diametrically opposed to what this book right here stands for”…

The supervisors voted against the center, including one who had previously approved it in his role on the county planning commission…

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NEWS AND VIEWS:

VIEWS: SOUTH SUDAN: MICHAEL GERSON’S CHRISTIANITY

Michael Gerson, the evangelical advisor to former President George W. Bush who was part of the Christian Right’s lobby to partition Sudan, is now a columnist with “The Washington Post”. He wrote today from South Sudan.

(Read below).

Yesterday, “The Washington Post” rejected an op-ed piece I had sent about my sadness and anger: sadness because of the partition of my native country, and anger because my adopted country encouraged the partition. My piece was “not right” for publication, I was told, but “it makes an interesting point about the media coverage” of events in Sudan.

What is “right”? What type of “media coverage”?

When I appealed the rejection of my piece – also rejected – I said that I had read within two weeks three pieces in the op-ed pages and all of them were critical of the North Sudan. This is what I meant by “media coverage.”

Of course, my sadness and anger increased because of the rejection of my piece because it was not “right” to be published.

But, many years ago, before the partition of Sudan was an issue, I learned that sadness and anger because of the US policies towards the Muslims and the Islamophobia that had engulfed the US, was not enough. And that was why I started my “Silent Jihad at the White House.”

The more sad and angry I became, the more determined – despite some questions in my mind, I confess – to continue my White House vigil “UNTIL I DIE!”

Back to Christian separationist Michael Gerson. He wrote: “South Sudan’s independence is also a bitter divorce”; “Southerners — black and Christian or animist — who had lived in the Muslim, Arabized north”; “The Sudanese paradox of deep hatreds and unavoidable ties”; and “The north may be hated, but it remains the south’s primary trading partner.”

Gerson and his Christian Right lobbied, as Islamophobia engulfed America, to partition Sudan to stop the spread of Islam in South Sudan (and in sub-Sahara Africa). Now, even before the official partition, he wrote about “bitter divorce” and “unavoidable ties.”

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NEWS: COLUMN: MICHAEL GERSON, FORM AWEIL, SOUTH SUDAN: “THE WASHINGTON POST”:

(Excerpts): “… But the train station near the center of Aweil provides a reminder that South Sudan’s independence is also a bitter divorce. A group of refugees sits beside the rails, surrounded by cooking pots and farm implements, their former lives carried in burlap bags. They are southerners — black and Christian or animist — who had lived in the Muslim, Arabized north…

An elderly man, Deng Deng Arop, tells me that their Arab neighbors had pressured them to leave. “They said, ‘You have to go to your own country. If you don’t go to the south, you will see what happens to you.’ ” Long lines of southerners waited to board trains. “They wanted to keep our sons by force,” says Deng…

And yet the ruler of northern Sudan, Omar al-Bashir — under indictment by the International Criminal Court — is scheduled to speak at South Sudan’s independence celebration. If he comes, it would show a boldness on Bashir’s part. It would also demonstrate the Sudanese paradox of deep hatreds and unavoidable ties…

By inviting Bashir to the independence celebration, South Sudan’s government is making its own calculation. The north may be hated, but it remains the south’s primary trading partner. Sixty percent of food consumed in South Sudan is either produced in or transported across the north. Though the south produces oil, it imports refined fuel from its northern neighbor…”

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NEWS AND VIEWS:

VIEWS: DUETSCHLAND UBER ALLES

The few times I was in Germany were at Frankfurt airport, but one of my dreams is to take a Rhine River cruise, see the castles and cathedrals and write about my fascination by the Germans.

What I know now is their stereotype as hard-working and disciplined people. Also, there is their recent history of Nazism, racial purity and killing of millions of Jews. And the most recently, there is the unification and the ascendance as the most powerful Europeans.

Being attracted, even at this late age, by beautiful blondes, German blondes have a special place in my heart.

Today, I read a review of a book about the Germans that was written during the first century after Christ, and the book seems to be describing the Germans of today.

(Read below)

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NEWS: BOOK: “GERMANIA”: “THE MOST DANGEROUS PEOPLE; MICHAEL DIRBA: “WASHINGTON POST”:

… “Germania” — “On Germany” — runs fewer than 40 pages, but, like other comparably short documents, such as the Declaration of Independence and “The Communist Manifesto,” its influence has been earthshaking. As the Penguin translator, H. Mattingly, frankly writes in his 1947 introduction, the book is “a detailed account of a great people that had already begun to be a European problem in the first century of our era.”

“Germania” is an early work by Tacitus (circa 56-120), whose greatest achievement, the “Annals,” provides our best account of Roman history under such “bad” emperors as Tiberius and Nero.

“Germania” concisely describes the customs and character of dozens of loosely affiliated northern tribes but also functions as an implicit moral tract: While Romans have sunk into softness and debauchery, the tough, blond barbarians living around the Rhine are unwaveringly loyal to their leaders, fierce in battle, without interest in gold and other baubles, obedient to their gods, chaste when young and faithful to their spouses when married.

Why are these Teutons such admirable physical specimens and moral beings? In the most unwittingly pernicious sentence of his superbly readable book, Tacitus writes at the opening of Chapter 4: “For myself I accept the view that the people of Germany have never been tainted by intermarriage with other peoples, and stand out as a nation peculiar, pure and unique of its kind.”

The Germans are, in short, racially homogenous. This accounts, Tacitus adds, for their common body type: blue eyes, flaxen hair, huge frames. Moreover, since battle is viewed as the sole worthwhile activity, young warriors are intensely devoted to their band (comitatus) and will fight to the death for their leader. Drinking to excess is almost the only vice among these noble savages, though they do sometimes sacrifice human beings in their religious ceremonies…

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NEWS AND VIEWS:

VIEWS: ONLY IN AMERICA: CHINESE INFERIORITY COMPLEX

As I am planning my memoir book, there will be, towards the end, a chapter on “blacks’ inferiority complex” Since I came to America about 35 years ago, I have been surprised, and saddened, by black Americans general pre-occupation with slavery, discrimination, the color of their skins and the N-word. Especially after I have come to believe that the color of my skin doesn’t have anything to do with my identity, and that the core of my identity is my faith (Islam).

To be fair to the black Americans, this 500-years old Western Christian civilization is very powerful and intimidating, especially in the eyes of Third World peoples. I know about Africans’ inferiority complex because I came from Africa; I have learned about Latinos’ inferiority complex since I came to America and during my many visits to Latin America; and now, I am learning about Asian inferiority complex, especially the Chinese.

As much as the Chinese seem to be able to challenge the dominance of the West, they have a long way to go, and mostly because of their: (a) economic backwardness; (b) absence of freedom and justice in their history; and (c) current absence of freedom and justice.

I learned about Chinese women whitening their skins, men formal Western attires, popularity of American songs, movies, TV programs, food and drinks. The following is about Chinese women and men trying to out-do the Americans.

(Read below).

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NEWS: “THE FINANCIAL TIMES” (OF LONDON): CHINESE WOMEN, CARS AND WHISKY

… Chinese women buy more whisky and fast cars than their western counterparts, for example, while men purchase more face creams and bags.

At one Shanghai Prada store, the shop assistant explains that Chinese men have more of a penchant for male handbags partly because they need to carry so much cash.

Victor Luis, president of Coach’s international business, says “man bags” are popular in China because they satisfy practical needs that are not counteracted by exaggerated notions of manliness.

L’Oréal sees a similar trend. The French group sells more male grooming products in mainland China than in Western Europe. It says Chinese men see appearance as key to social and professional success. A glimpse at the jet black hairdos of China’s top political leaders – most of whom are elderly – drives home the point that Chinese men are enthusiastic consumers of hair dye.

McKinsey says women in China are increasing their spending on luxury goods twice as fast as men, prompting western companies to try to understand what makes Chinese women tick.

“In China, women are ambitious … so they will buy more ‘high powered’ products than women in the US or Europe,” says Tom Doctoroff, greater China head of JWT, the advertising agency. “A woman here needs to project her power in ways that a western woman simply does not need to.”

Luxury car companies are finding the age-old desire among the rich to drive a fast car in China is unisex. Maserati says 30 per cent of its Chinese buyers are female, far higher than the 2-5 per cent common in Europe and the US.

More Chinese women drink Johnnie Walker whisky than in the west, according to Diageo. As a result, it plans to make the brand more “gender bilingual” and include more women in a social media ad campaign.

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NEWS AND VIEWS:

VIEWS: MY SUMMER VACATION AND THE POWERFUL SUMMER VACATIONS:

Since 1980, a Washington, DC, full-time journalist for major Arabic newspapers and magazines in the Middle East, my summer vacation has been mostly in Hollywood, Florida, where my wife’s parents live, and sometimes in Boon, NC, where they have a summer house.

I don’t go to Sudan as often as I would want, but I am planning a one week visit this summer. (My 15 brothers and sisters hold an annual memorial gathering for our father and mother, and I didn’t attend it before; I would like to briefly connect with my very large family).

Since 2007, I started an annual family Caribbean cruise out of Florida. Early summer, for 11 days, we took “Caribbean Princess” to six islands. We are planning another cruise next year on “Queen Victoria,” one the most elegant large cruise ships.

For this Sudanese village boy, this will be the top of the top.

The last chapter in my planned memoir book will be: From “Queen Victoria” (a Nile River coal-driven paddle steamer that I took for my first trip from the village to the city, during the last days of the British rule of Sudan) to “Queen Victoria” (the elegant Caribbean cruise ship).

I am not jealous (I always say “Alhamdulilahi”), but I always wonder how the rich and the powerful spent their summers.

(Read below).

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NEWS: “THE FIANANCIAL TIMES” (OF LONDON): HOW THEY SPEND SUMMER?

FORMER SECRETARY OF SATE JAMES BAKER:

“My wife Susan and I usually spend August at our remodelled old homesteader’s cabin on Silver Creek in Wyoming. It is a beautiful place with a wonderful trout stream coursing through it…

We catch and release four types of trout that live in our stream. We take long walks and enjoy watching elk, antelope, deer, black bear, moose and mountain lion. And we entertain friends. We hunt elk in the fall…

It would be wonderful if any one of my former bosses – Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan or George HW Bush – could come visit. So much has happened in our country and the world since I worked with each of them, so it would be very interesting to hear their takes on current events.

Item unable to leave at home: My yoga mat. It has been my companion at home, on trips and during vacation since Susan convinced me three years ago that at my age I needed to do yoga to be flexible…

We’re a 30-minute drive from the nearest “civilisation”, so we eat in most of the time… In November, we’re going on a buffalo hunting safari in Tanzania.

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JOHN STUDZINSKI, SENIOR DIRECTOR, BLACKSTONE GROUP:

“I go to three or four places. I go to Lourdes on pilgrimage, to work with the sick. I go to Salzburg to climb the Alps and listen to music and drink Austrian Burgundy in the evening. I go to Italy to enjoy the Amalfi coast. Then I go to my farm in America to chill out and go back to my roots. I also spend some time in 40C heat in my castle in Trujillo in Spain…

Every summer I read and reread War and Peace. I’ve done it for the past 30 years; I think it’s the best tutorial on humanity…Holidays are about close friends, intensive culture, intensive walking and nature, and putting time and the planet in perspective…

Item unable to leave at home: It’s a toss-up between my rosary beads and my mobile phone…

I would like to go next to New Zealand.

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EDITOR OF “VANITY FAIR” GRAYDON CARTER:

I’m at a glorious health spa in Austria with my friend Reinaldo Herrera. We are taking the cure… Following this, I have a week and a half of business travel in Europe. Then I’m taking my wife, five kids, two girlfriends (theirs), a nanny, my wife’s father, and my mother, to Rome and Porto Ercole for another two weeks.

When you arrive, we generally unpack and then lie down. I find any kind of travel exhausting…

I do like to swim. And then poking around market towns, reading, and just eating, drinking and gabbing…I generally take a photograph of my kids in a small silver frame even when they are on the trip with me. And my iPod…

I’d love to go to Prague and Budapest. And Turkey.

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NEWS AND VIEWS:

SUPPORT TALIBAN CAUSE: TALIBAN’S VIDEOS:

About half a century ago, as a young journalist with “Alsahafa” Arabic daily newspaper in Sudan, I, almost daily and for many years, covered the Vietnam War, and especially the US military intervention in South Vietnam, its bombardment of North Vietnam and its war against the Viet Cong rebels (who, at the end, won, expelled the US and united North and South Vietnam).

I wasn’t a Communist, a socialist, a progressive or a leftist – and never was – but I was strongly supporting the Viet Cong. The US was the aggressor and its excuse of the “domino theory” has been proven wrong.

Another proof: Last week, the US and Vietnam navies conducted a joint exercise, an indirect message to China. (During the Vietnam War, China was the main supporter and supplier of the Vietnamese Communists).

Now, I am

not an Islamist, a Jihadist, a Sharia-supporter, a West-hater or a Caliphate-believer – and never was – but I strongly support Taliban cause. The US is the aggressor and its excuse of “draining the swamps” (words of former President George W. Bush) has been proven wrong. The so-called “war of terrorism” has no specific fronts, enemies, goals and definition of “victory.”

Another proof: after 10 years of fighting Taliban, the US decided to negotiate with them.

Déjà vu.

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NEWS: TALIBAN VIDEOS: “WASHINGTON POST”:

Kabul — On a street of pulsing electronic shops, young men with spiked hair and tight jeans browse through DVD stalls and huddle over sidewalk computer stands, downloading the latest hot song or video clip and passing them instantly via bluetooth technology from cellphone to cellphone…

Often the content is sexually alluring and semi-forbidden in Afghan society… But in recent months, another craze has gripped the capital circuit…

The images are of real war and shocking violence: U.S. military vehicles exploding; Western troops tossed high in the air; terrified foreigners being dragged and mutilated. The soundtracks are a mix of gunfire and chants in male voices praising fallen heroes and calling for sacrifice in the name of Islam.

“O Talib, come to my dreams,” begins one. “The brave infidel slayers are everywhere. We will burn their tanks and set them on fire. The brave infidel slayers are turned to ashes, but they still live. . . . O Talib, come to my grave. The infidel dragons have killed me; follow my footsteps when I am gone.”

On the surface, most urban and educated young Afghans seem to have little in common with the rural Taliban fighters — and zero desire to fight. Yet they might also be ambivalent about whom to root for in a war that pits increasingly unpopular NATO forces against homegrown fellow Muslims…

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