Their writings are thinly veiled pornography. Fred Phelps is an attorney who has been disbarred in Kansas and the federal court system for "little regard for the ethics of the system" and for being dishonest, according to published reports. Fred Phelps has little regard for anything or anyone but himself and his flock of sheep.

It would be nice if no one paid attention. It would be nice if the press refused to cover this debacle of first amendment right. Then it would be a wasted effort. They wouldn't get the one thing they came for - publicity. Unfortunately, the press being what it is, that probably won't happen.

On January 2, the students at Dover High School will get an education like they've never had before. And although one's first inclination might be to protect them from the filth that will be thrust into their consciousness, perhaps they need to see and read it. Perhaps they need to learn about the real evil in the world. Perhaps they need to understand that when they graduate it will be up to them to change their world, embrace all kinds of people and make the world safe and welcoming for everyone.

So to all of you at Dover High - Good and God are with you. Stand strong and go forth.

"He lost the popular vote and ended the year with stratospheric poll ratings. He began the year as Clark Kent and ended up as Superman,'' said conservative analyst Marshall Wittmann of the Hudson Institute.

Public concerns about terrorist attacks, homeland defense and the anti-terror war overseas rearranged political priorities across the board. And that came on top of a political year that was already remarkable.

"It was a truly extraordinary period,'' said Thomas Mann a political scholar at the Brookings Institution. "We had four mega-events over the last year.''

Mann described the events this way:

-"The most controversial presidential election in history.''

-"A change in party control of the U.S. Senate in mid-session.''

-"A sudden shift from a decade of prosperity to recession and the reappearance of deficits.''

-"And we had September 11th.''

Three of those four events have helped shape today's political reality. The fourth - the contested presidential election - has faded into the background.

Tom Daschle of South Dakota, the Senate majority leader, became the most prominent Democrat when Vermont Republican Jim Jeffords became an independent in May. Then-Majority Leader Trent Lott of Mississippi and Senate Republicans were pushed from power.

Talk of balanced budgets, changes in Social Security and social programs requiring substantial new money faded as the economy tanked.

Issues like national security, missile defense and international coalition building moved to the forefront for the first time in a decade.

"A new seriousness overtook American politics,'' said Mann. "It was a radical change from the 1990s when politics was so nasty and trivial because the stakes were low. Now there is a real threat.''

Beneficiaries were the members of the experienced foreign affairs team put together by Bush - especially Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, Secretary of State Colin Powell and Vice President Dick Cheney, a former defense secretary.

Another politician whose fortunes soared after Sept. 11 was New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. His health problems and an embarrassing divorce were dominant images of the mayor before the attacks. But his steady, calm manner afterward earned him widespread respect.

The intense focus on the anti-terror campaign pushed news about most politics - especially the 2004 presidential race - far from view.

Democrats who needed to build their national profiles found they got almost no public attention for political activities.

Al Gore, the former vice president and Democratic presidential nominee won the popular vote in the 2000 election. He was evenly matched against Bush in polls before Sept. 11. After the attacks, Bush led Gore in a hypothetical matchup by a 2-1 margin.

The public had a favorable view of almost everyone serving in government and for government in general. The attacks had reminded them they need government to keep them safe.

"By suspending politics for two months, everybody's evaluations went up - of state legislators, governors and the president,'' said Bruce Cain, a political scientist from the University of California-Berkeley. "It was an interesting national experiment - the less politicians attacked one another, the higher the public's estimation of government and politics.''

But Democrats have decided they can fight politically about domestic issues, while supporting Bush on the war. And by year's end, both parties had resumed the partisan political fight.

Democrats are betting a slumping economy and an easing of terrorism fears could give them an opening on their top domestic issues in the 2002 congressional elections.

But any hopes they had of challenging Bush's claim to the presidency are gone.

"Whatever happens in the future, questions about George Bush's legitimacy have completely disappeared,'' said University of Virginia political scientist Larry Sabato.

And the question about who can lead a sharply divided nation has been answered.

"It was an awful way to get there,'' said political scientist Merle Black of Emory University, "but Americans did find a leader.''

In his message, the Iranian president stressed Iran's unwavering positions and announced Iran's decisive support to the right of the oppressed people in Lebanon, Syria and Palestine by the Israeli occupation.

The Iranian President stressed in his message that the current conditions makes it imperative to maintain coordination in the stances of the Arab and Islamic states.

He expressed his satisfaction over President Lahoud's stances in defending the legitimate and legal rights of the Palestinian and Lebanese people.

President Lahoud asked al-Sader to convey his greetings and good wishes to the Iranian President Muhammad Khatami, coupled with his thanks over his continued voiced support to the Lebanese people.

Discussions dealt with current regional and international developments and the position of both Lebanon and Iran towards them.

The Lebanese President renewed his assertion on the Lebanese political principles and the strategic options, stressing the need of strengthening cooperation between Lebanon and Iran in all fields.

Following his meeting with President Lahoud, al-Sader said that the Hizbullah was founded to eliminate the Israeli occupation and as far as this occupation lasts and a Lebanese territory is occupied, it is then the right of Lebanon to resist occupation.

Al-Sader indicated that discussions dealt with the date for the visit of President Khatami to Lebanon, noting that Lebanon will be among the first countries President Khatami will visit in the future.

Due to a mechanical problem, the initial commercial flight and the officer was rescheduled on another flight with the same company. ADC reports that the officer was confronted by airline security personnel and was asked to exit the plane and submit to additional security checks.

After a delay of one hour and fifteen minutes, during which the officer was questioned by the American Airlines' flight's pilot, airline officials, and airport police, he was removed from the flight despite the fact that the officer offered to have the United States Secret Service verify his identity as a member of the Secret Service attached to President Bush's security service. No other reason was given for his removal.

Brian Marr, the Secret Service spokesman has confirmed the account of this incident to the media. This incident was also reported by many media outlets.

ADC says it has been directly contacted by the officer and filed an official complaint with the proper authorities at the United States Department of Transportation and requested that American Airlines take the necessary steps to remedy the situation.

ADC Legal Advisors consulted with the officer and provided him with legal recommendations and potential attorney representation.

ADC adds that while it strongly supports all measures to secure air travel as outlined by all U.S. Department of Transportation and Federal Aviation Administration directives, it deems that the incident clearly points to national origin and/or ethnic discrimination by American Airlines and its agents. The unjustified and discourteous treatment of the officer, in charge of the U.S. president safety, cannot be attributed to random security measures or random passenger inspections and is indefensible and unacceptable, says ADC.

The Israeli radio quoted Sharon as saying on Thursday during his meeting with several members of the extremist Likud party that the only contacts permitted with the Palestinians are those for ceasing fire, noting his intention to preside over the Israeli side in any future negotiations with the Palestinians.

Sharon considered that Tenet document is in contradiction with his position towards the establishment of the Palestinian state, noting he informed his foreign minister and members of his government that the agreement concluded recently between the Israeli foreign minister Shimon Peres and the chairman of the Palestinian legislative council Ahmad Qrei' to this effect is valueless because it was not submitted to the Israeli cabinet.

For his part the chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Oreikat said that the memorandum submitted by Shimon Peres to resuming negotiations between the two sides includes several elements that can not be accepted by the Palestinian side.

Bin Laden said it is important to strike the US base of America, which is the ground for the military base in it. If their economy ends they will be preoccupied by controlling weak peoples.

He added that those who carried out the attacks against the US had given the hard lesson to those " intransigent peoples" which see no meaning to freedom unless they follow the " white race." Bin Laden stressed that the conflict with the US is very grave not only for Muslims but also for the world as whole. He said what the US accuses " the few people whom he described as Mujahedeen for the sake of the God" is not built on an evidence, rather on repression and aggression, as he claimed.

He added that the alleged terrorism practiced in all its forms in Palestine and Iraq where one million Iraqi children were killed, noting that the " nation" should wake up to find out a solution for this crisis which threatens humanity as a whole.

The duration of the tape lasted for 33 minutes and al-Jazira TV said it was registered 15 days earlier.

To this effect, news reports said that Bin Laden seemed very obvious while his left arm stayed unmoved, a situation which raises questions on his health conditions.

Meantime, an Afghani official announced that Bin Laden is in one of the Pakistani areas, but Pakistan firmly denied these information and stressed they are groundless.

During his meeting on Thursday with the press at the presidential palace on the occasion of the end of the year, the Lebanese president said that Lebanon " has established itself as a one, solid strong and effective state and all this has been achieved is a result of the clear policy it has pursued and the national options it cling to within strategies that prove credibility."

He added that the coming phase requires protection of all achievements realized at the national level and to dedicate efforts to economic and social development through a future vision that would be materialized by all.

The Israeli radio quoted Nafe as saying in the context of replying proposals concerning the Knesset's agenda submitted on the background of preventing Arafat from taking part in the mass given in Bethlehem on the occasion of the Christmas on Monday evening that " Arafat is not a Christian Saint, he is rather a Muslim terrorist."

Nafe also accused the Palestinian authority of violating Christianity. A matter which provoked anger of these Arab members and pushed them to strongly protest these racist statements.

Nafe also expressed his regret that the PA did not hand over the Palestinian resistance men who carry out operations against the Israeli occupation army in Israel.

The MBC correspondent in Brussels said that these documents are available since several weeks at the Belgian judiciary and confirm Sharon's confession before the Israeli Kahana extremist committee in 1982 that he had green-lighted for breaking into the two said camps.

On Wednesday, the Belgian court followed up necessary steps to be taken to start investigations with the Israeli prime minister of war crime accusations and listened to interventions made by the victims and discussed the question of the Belgian judiciary validity.

Lawyer Michael Verhaig who is the defendant of 23 of the victims of Sabra and Shatila committed in 1982 described Wednesday's session as very positive. He said in a statements to SANA's correspondent in Brussels the two focal points debated on Wednesday seized the attention of the Belgian judiciary.

Moreover 23 of victims of the Sabra and Shatilla massacres filed a complaint on June this year through the civil attorney in Brussels, according to the world validity law which aims to controlling war crimes and the crimes against humanity and mass annihilation. The said law authorizes trying foreigners accused of such crimes even such crimes are committed outside Belgium.

Other 6 Palestinians filed another case by the end of November this year against Sharon through the civil attorney law which is based on the world validity law adopted by the Belgian parliament in 1993 and amended in 1999.

Headline: ". The occupying authorities steal body parts from martyrs to use in hospitals"

Excerpts from the text:

". When the occupying authority holds the bodies of martyrs. it does so in order to hide the traces of its crimes. The witnesses and evidence prove that the occupation forces torture the bodies of the martyrs on purpose and fire bullets into them at close range. There are clear indicators that the occupying authorities steal body parts of the martyrs during the holding process, in order to use them in Israeli hospitals, especially for Israeli patients in need of transplants. After they seize the body parts of the martyrs, they bury the corpses.under dubious circumstances, scorning humanitarian values and moral and religious regulations. Legal authorities noted that the occupation's refusal to surrender the bodies of the martyrs to their families is intended to hide the truth of their non-humanitarian practices on the bodies of the martyrs." [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Dec 24] (PMW Dec 24)

Richard Reid, 28, is suspected of trying to ignite plastic explosives in his shoes aboard a U.S.-bound commercial airplane. He is scheduled to appear in a U.S. federal court for a bail hearing on Friday.

"He's not a bad lad," the elder Reid told The Daily Mirror. "I can't imagine him doing anything like this without being involved with somebody else."

Reid is charged with interfering with a flight crew. His flight left Paris last Saturday bound for Miami, but it was diverted to Boston after a flight attendant saw him trying to set fire to one of his shoes.

The British national was subdued and sedated by passengers and crew members. The FBI said his shoes contained sophisticated plastic explosive.

"My son is a determined boy and I can imagine him being determined enough to blow himself to bits," said Robin Reid, who has spent 18 years in jail, according to the London tabloid.

"But I just can't believe that he would want to hurt anyone else in doing it -- unless, that is, he has been brainwashed, which seems the case. He would not have done it off his own bat without being coaxed, talked into it."

If you have not yet seen the new formations that appeared at Chilbolton in Hampshire at the weekend, glance to the right. If you thought the Milk Hill fractal would be the last wonder of the season, be prepared - you might be wrong!

Two formations were reported to have appeared on Sunday 19th August in a wheat field next to the radio telescope at Chilbolton, Hampshire. One is a very strange rectangular formation with what looks distinctly like some kind of digital code displayed within it, the code being illustrated by standing patterns of crop. The second formation is also completely unique; at first it appears to be a random collection of standing circular clumps of varying sizes, also contained within a rectangle shape. However, as you get further from the pattern and gain some perspective, suddenly, and quite spookily, you see a face staring out at you from the crop field! Nothing like this has ever been seen before.

What is so interesting is that this 'dot matrix face' and the strip of code next to the radio telescope are remarkably similar to the kinds of coded information we sent out into space on the Voyager spacecraft. Could this be our reply or some strange intergalactic echo?

Many have already commented that they see a distinct similarity between this formation and the mysterious 'face' on Mars.

Is this the face of the real circlemakers or a likeness of our own image engraved into the crop fields of Hampshire? Watch this space... Or is it space watching us?

Several hypotheses have been advanced to explain this uncharacteristic restraint. Sharon is seeking to keep faith with his more conciliatory foreign minister, Shimon Peres. He is hoping to collect some moral credit, which he will use to defend much fiercer intervention at a later date. The seizure of Palestinian offices does more to hurt their cause than the murder of prominent figures. All these explanations are plausible, but there is another possible interpretation, overlooked by almost everyone. In killing Palestinians, Ariel Sharon can no longer be sure that he is killing only Palestinians.

For the past few weeks, foreign peace activists belonging to the international solidarity movement have been arriving in Jerusalem and the West Bank, joining demonstrations, staying in the homes of threatened Palestinians, turning themselves into human shields between the Israeli army and its targets. A few days ago they were joined by one of the most remarkable forces in British politics, a group of mostly middle-aged or elderly campaigners called Women in Black UK. These Hell's Grannies have moved straight into the front line, ensuring that the brutality with which the Palestinians are routinely treated now has international repercussions: Israel can't hurt local people without hurting them too.

For the past few nights, members of the solidarity movement have been sleeping in the homes of Palestinians in the Bethlehem suburb of Beit Jala. Eight hundred and fifty homes here have been shelled by soldiers stationed in the neighbouring Jewish settlement of Gilo, as the army seeks to expel the Palestinians in order to expand Israel's illegal plantation.

The foreigners have been standing at army checkpoints, photographing soldiers when they stop people trying to leave or enter their communities and recording the names of those they arrest. The soldiers hate this scrutiny, but whenever the monitors arrive at a checkpoint, there's a marked reduction in the violence there.

The Women in Black also helped to organise the demonstrations outside Orient House, the Palestinian headquarters seized by Israel on Friday. They established the physical and political space in which Palestinians could protest non-violently. Arrested and beaten up with the local people, the women witnessed the torture of Palestinian prisoners in the police station, which would otherwise have gone unrecorded.

In short, these volunteer peacekeepers are seeking to do precisely what foreign governments have promised but failed to do: to monitor and contest abuses of human rights, to defuse violence, and to challenge Israel's ethnic cleansing programme. Their actions put us all to shame.

As well as seeking to enforce peace, they are trying, hard as it is in the current atmosphere, to broker it. They have been suggesting to their Palestinian hosts some of the novel means by which injustice can be confronted without the use of violence. They have plenty of experience to draw on.

Some of these activists have been involved in the Trident Ploughshares campaign which, over the past fortnight, has been running rings round the marines guarding the nuclear submarines in Scotland. To the astonishment of the guards, the protesters there have managed to evade the tightest security in the UK, swimming into the docks in which the submarines are moored and spray-painting the words "useless" and "illegal" on their sides. They have launched canoes and home-made rafts into the paths of submarines trying to leave their berths. They have cut through the razor wire and roamed around the base, hoping to arrest its commander for crimes against humanity. A few days ago, they blocked the main gates of the nuclear warhead depot, their arms embedded in barrels of concrete, bringing work to a halt as the police tried to figure out how to extract them.

Two years ago, three of these women climbed into the Trident programme's floating research laboratory on Loch Goil and, as a delightful new video commissioned by the Quakers shows, threw all its computers into the sea. In Greenock court, they were acquitted of criminal damage, after the sherriff accepted their defence that the Trident programme infringes international law: rather than committing a crime, they were preventing one. Soon afterwards, the women "borrowed" a police boat from the Trident base in Coulport and drove it into the submarine docks at Faslane. Among them was one of the women who were also found not guilty in 1996 after smashing up a Hawk aircraft bound for East Timor. The subsequent publicity forced the government to stop exporting Hawks to Indonesia.

Though they're acquitted as often as they're convicted, Hell's Grannies have spent much of the past few years in jail. They take full responsibility for their actions. If the police fail to spot them, they ring them up and ask to be arrested. Their candour, clarity and humour have played well in court, but the risks of this accountable campaigning are enormous. The prosecution began yesterday of 17 British and American Greenpeace activists, who are being tried on terrorism charges after peacefully occupying the Californian launch pad being used for George Bush's missile defence tests. In the Middle East such tactics are likely to be still more dangerous, as Israeli soldiers have shown no hesitation in killing protesters in cold blood. But, as Gandhi recognised, the brutal treatment of non-violent campaigners can destroy the moral authority of the oppressor, generating inexorable pressure for change.

The Women in Black are clearly prepared not only to die for their cause, but also to make what Dostoevsky correctly identified as a far greater sacrifice: to live for their cause. They are ready to lose their homes, their comforts, their liberty, to be vilified, beaten up and imprisoned. Their accountable actions require a far greater courage than throwing bricks at the police.

Most importantly perhaps, these campaigners never cease to acknowledge the humanity of their opponents. They seek not to threaten but to persuade. The results can be astonishing. The MoD police who pulled the Trident swimmers out of the water ferried them back to their camp, rather than arresting them, while massaging their legs to stop cramp. When Angie Zelter, one of the coordinators of Women in Black, was on remand for her attempts to demolish the British military machine, she was visited in prison by a timber merchant whose business she had once tried to shut down. He had, as a result of her campaign, stopped importing mahogany stolen from indigenous reserves in Brazil, and started refashioning his business along ethical lines, and now he needed her advice.

All this is a long-winded way of saying something which, in the 21st century, sounds rather embarrassing: these people are my heroes. They confront us with our own cowardice, our failure to match our convictions with action. We talk about it, they do it. Hell's Grannies are walking through fire. If they can, why can't we all?

Even more regrettable is the reticence of Mary Robinson, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, to revisit the issue: "If there is an attempt to revive the idea of Zionism as racism we will not have a successful conference." (Toronto Globe and Mail, July 28).

I submit that a conference that willfully ignored the worst sustained human rights violation of the last 60 years is irredeemably compromised. By this willful sin of omission it will tacitly condone the very kind racism it purports to abhor.

Even a cursory examination of the Zionist enterprise and statements by its practitioners provides ample prima facie proof that Zionism is, has been, and will always be, racist.

Zionism as racism

* "Both the process of expropriation and removal of the poor must be carried out discreetly and circumspectly." Theodore Herzl in The Complete Diaries, Chapter I, p. 88.

* "The Palestinian refugees will find their place in the diaspora. Those who can resist will live thanks to natural selection. The others will simply crumble. Some of them will persist, but the majority will be a human heap, the scum of the earth, and will sink into the lowest levels of the Arab world," Near East Department of the Israeli government, 1948.

* "There is no other way than to transfer the Arabs from here to the neighboring countries, to transfer all of them; not one village, not one tribe, should be left." Joseph Weitz, the Jewish National Fund administrator for Zionist colonization (1967), from My Diary and Letters to the Children, Chapter III, p. 293.

* "The only good Arab is a dead Arab...When we have settled the land, all the Arabs will be able to do about it will be to scurry around like drugged cockroaches in a bottle," Rafael Eitan, Likud leader of the Tsomet faction (1981) in Noam Chomsky, Fateful Triangle, pp 129, 130.

* "It is forbidden to be merciful to them, you must give them missiles, with relish - annihilate them. Evil ones, damnable ones. May the Holy Name visit retribution on the Arabs' heads, and cause their seed to be lost, and annihilate them, and cause them to be vanquished and cause them to be cast from the world," Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, founder and spiritual leader of the Shas party, Ma'ariv, April, 9, 2001.

In reaction to Yosef's statements, Interior minister Eli Yesha said supportively: "They reflected the overall state of thinking of the Israeli Jewish society."

These five citations, from Herzl to the present, show that Zionism is, at root, a conscious war of extermination and expropriation against a native civilian population. In the modern vernacular, Zionism is the theory and practice of "ethnic cleansing," which the UN has defined as a war crime.

Unfortunately, justice doesn't always win against a determined campaign of disinformation and intimidation. In 1991, under intense pressure from Israel and the North American Jewish lobby, the UN reversed itself on Zionism, thereby denying the truth it spoke 16 years earlier.

The Zionist argument, then as now, consists of the falsehood that the UN's action itself constituted an act of racism. Zionism, we are told, is merely the national expression of Jewish self-determination. Thus, to condemn Zionism is to condemn all Jewry--an act of "anti-Semitism."

The epithet "anti-Semitism" is hurled to silence anyone, even other Jews, brave enough to decry Israel's systematic, decades-long pogrom against the Palestinian Arabs. Because of the Holocaust, "anti-Semitism" is such a powerful instrument of emotional blackmail that it effectively pre-empts rational discussion of Israel and its conduct.

It is for this reason that many good people can witness daily evidence of Israeli inhumanity toward the "Palestinians' collective punishment," destruction of olive groves, routine harassment, judicial prejudice, denial of medical services, assassinations, torture, apartheid-based segregation, etc. -- yet not denounce it for fear of being branded "anti-Semitic."

To be free to acknowledge Zionism's racist nature, therefore, one must debunk the calumny of "anti-Semitism." Once this is done, not only will the criminality of Israel be undeniable, but Israel, itself, will be shown to be the embodiment of the very anti-Semitism it purports to condemn.

Zionism as anti-Semitism (general case)

First, we need to rectify one major misunderstanding. The words "Semite" and "Semitic" refer to more than Jews and Jewishness. Strictly speaking, "semitic" is a linguistic term denoting a family of Afro-Asiatic languages, of which we have today Arabic, Hebrew, Maltese, and the South Arabic languages of northern Ethiopia.

Ancient semitic languages included Akkadian, Sumerian, Canaanite, Amorite, Ugaritic, Phoenician, Punic, Aramaic, as well as ancient Hebrew and Syriac.

Thus, anyone who spoke or speaks these languages is by definition a Semite, though the term only came into use in 1813. In the case of the Middle East, Semites include the Palestinian Arabs. Not only do they speak a semitic language (Arabic), but they are the direct blood descendants of the Canaanites, whom we know as the Philistines.

Now, the Zionist Jews who founded Israel are another matter. For the most part, they are not Semites, and their language (Yiddish) is not semitic. These Ashkenazi ("German") Jews -- as opposed to the Sephardic ("Spanish") Jews -- have no connection whatever to any of the aforementioned ancient peoples or languages.

They are mostly East European Slavs descended from the Khazars, a nomadic Turko-Finnic people that migrated out of the Caucasus in the second century and came to settle, broadly speaking, in what is now Southern Russia and Ukraine.

In A.D. 740, the khagan (ruler) of Khazaria, decided that paganism wasn't good enough for his people and decided to adopt one of the "heavenly" religions: Judaism, Christianity or Islam. After a process of elimination he chose Judaism, and from that point the Khazars adopted Judaism as the official state religion.

The history of the Khazars and their conversion is a documented, undisputed part of Jewish history, but it is never publicly discussed. It is, as former U.S. State Department official Alfred M. Lilienthal declared, "Israel's Achilles heel," for it proves that Zionists have no claim to the land of the Biblical Hebrews.

Thus what we know as the "Jewish State" of Israel is really an ethnocentric garrison state established by a non-Semitic people for the declared purpose of dispossessing and terrorizing a civilian semitic people. In fact from Nov. 27, 1947, to May 15, 1948, more that 300,000 Arabs were forced from their homes and villages. By the end of the year, the number was close to 800,000 by Israeli estimates. Today, Palestinian refugees number in the millions.

That the Jews knew they were committing a criminal act is shown by a eulogy Foreign Minister Moshe Dayan delivered for a Jew killed by Arabs on the Gaza border in 1956:

"Let us not heap accusations on the murderers," he said. "How can we complain about their deep hatred for us? For eight years they have been sitting in the Gaza refugee camps, and before their very eyes, we are possessing the land and the villages where they and their ancestors have lived. We are the generation of colonizers, and without the steel helmet and the gun barrel we cannot plant a tree and build a home."

In April 1969, Dayan told the Jewish newspaper Ha'aretz: "There is not one single place built in this country that did not have a former Arab population."

Clearly, the equation of Zionism with racism is founded on solid historical evidence, and the charge of anti-Semitism is absurd.

Zionism as anti-Semitism (specific case)

Despite the preceding evidence, Zionists still have one rhetorical weapon that must be defused: the claim that the state of Israel is necessary because Jews need a safe haven from "anti-Semitism" in the non-Jewish world. Zionists insist that anti-Semitism is solely a crime against Jews, and that criticism of Zionism is by definition an attack upon Jews, a denigration of the Holocaust, and therefore "anti-Semitic."

The image of Israel as a necessary bastion for Jews is compelling enough to convince reasonable people that equating Zionism with racism is morally wrong. This was especially true in the immediate post-war world: "Generally speaking, the Zionists succeeded in persuading large segments of world public opinion to link the Zionist cause with the Holocaust," wrote Professor Ilan Pappé of Haifa University. "Against such a claim, even able Palestinian diplomats -- and there were not many in those days -- could hardly win the diplomatic game." The Journal of Palestine Studies (Winter 1997).

The equation of Zionism with the Holocaust, though, is based on a false presumption. Far from being a haven for all Jews, Israel is founded by Zionist Jews who helped the Nazis fill the gas chambers and stoke the ovens of the death camps. Israel would not be possible today if the World Zionist Congress and other Zionist agencies hadn't formed common cause with Hitler's exterminators to rid Europe of Jews.

In exchange for helping round up non-Zionist Jews, sabotage Jewish resistance movements, and betray the trust of Jews, Zionists secured for themselves safe passage to Palestine. This arrangement was formalized in a number of emigration agreements signed in 1938. The most notorious case of Zionist collusion concerned Dr. Rudolf Kastner Chairman of the Zionist Organization in Hungary from 1943-45. To secure the safe passage of 600 Zionists to Palestine, he helped the Nazis send 800,000 Hungarian Jews to their deaths. The Israeli Supreme Court virtually whitewashed Kastner's crimes because to admit them would have denied Israel the moral right to exist.

As the Jewish-Israeli scholar Benjamin Beit-Hallahmi wrote: "Out of the original sins of the world against the Jews grew the original sins of Zionism against the Palestinians: Its memory poisons the blood and marks every moment of existence." (Original Sins -- Reflections of the History of Zionism and Israel. p. 216.)

If this horror seems incredible or aberrant, it shouldn't. In a letter to the Zionist executive on Dec. 17, 1938, David Ben-Gurion stated it openly and unapologetically: "The saving of Jewish lives from Hitler is considered here as a potential threat to Zionism, unless they are brought to Palestine. When Zionism had to choose between the Jewish people and the Jewish state, it unhesitatingly preferred the latter...

"Zionism accepts anti-Semitism as the natural, normal attitude of the non-Jewish world toward the Jew. It does not consider it as a distorted, perverted phenomenon; it is a response to anti-Semitism, but not a confrontation, denunciation or fight against it." (Faris Yahya, Zionist Relations with Nazi Germany, p. 78.)

Even today, pro-Israeli journalists and publishers play up acts of violence against Jews to give the illusion that anti-Semitism is rampant and to manufacture consent for Zionism as a virtuous, necessary ideology. Journalists who try present a balanced view of Israel, to say nothing of a critical one, are silenced or terrorized. This goes for Jews as well as non-Jews.

On Nov. 10, 2000, the American-Jewish editor in chief of the Kansas City Jewish Chronicle, Debbie Ducro, published an impassioned 1,150 word article from another Jew decrying Israeli atrocities against the Palestinians. The writer, Judith Stone, even used the term Israeli Shoah, to draw allusion to Hitler's genocidal war against the Jews. Ducro was fired on Nov. 11.

In San Francisco, Rabbi Michael Lerner has endured death threats and vicious harassment from right-wing Jews because he gives voice to Palestinian views on his website and in the magazine Tikkun.

"An Israeli web site called 'self-hate' has identified me as one of the five enemies of the Jewish people, and printed my home address and driving instructions on how to get to my home," wrote Lerner in a May 13 e-mail. "We reported this to the police, the Israeli consulate, and to the Anti Defamation league. The ADL said it wasn't their concern because this was not a 'hate crime."

Here's a typical letter that Lerner said Tikkun received: "You subhuman leftist animals. You should all be exterminated. You are the lowest of the low life" (David Raziel in Hebron).

If anyone other than a Jew had written this, you can be sure that the ADL and any other Jewish lobby groups would have gone into full attack mode. In other words, when non-Jews slander and threaten Jews, it's called "anti-Semitism" and "hate crime'; when Zionists slander and threaten Jews, nobody is supposed to notice.

Summary

War crimes occur when cruelty is made to appear honourable, and good people stand by and do nothing to stop it.

The world watched as the Nazis unleashed state-sanctioned terrorism against the Jews, who were deemed to be sub-human (Untermenschen) - not worthy of dignity, respect or legal protection under the law. To kill a Jew, to destroy his livelihood, to force him and his family out of their homes - these were accepted, sanctioned forms of conduct by citizens of the German Reich to rid Europe of a specific group of people.

Today, the world watches as Israelis unleash state-sanctioned terrorism against Palestinians, who are deemed to be sub-human (Untermenschen) - not worthy of dignity, respect or legal protection under the law. (See citations above.) To kill a Palestinian, to destroy his livelihood, to force him and his family out of their homes - these are accepted, sanctioned forms of conduct by citizens of the Zionist Reich designed to rid Palestine of a specific group of people.

If Nazism is racist and deserving of absolute censure, then so is Zionism, for they are both fruit of the poisonous tree of fascism. It cannot be considered "anti-Semitic" to acknowledge this fact.

To condemn Israeli terrorism, does not in any way imply animus against Jews; neither does it attempt to diminish the Holocaust. In fact, the opposite is true. Zionists did nothing to aid non-Zionist survivors of the death camps, and did everything they could to coerce them to come to Palestine. For Zionists, the only Jew worth saving from the camps was one who wanted to build the Jewish State.

As famed violinist Lord Yehudi Menuhin told the French newspaper Le Figaro in January 1988: "It is extraordinary how nothing ever dies completely. Even the evil which prevailed yesterday in Nazi Germany is gaining ground in that country [Israel] today."

For it to have any moral authority, the UN must equate Zionism with racism. If it doesn't, it tacitly condones Israel's war of extermination against the Palestinians.

Mr. Greg Felton is a Canadian editorialist on international politics, especially the Middle East. He can be reached at

I want to thank you for coming, Tommy. I am real proud of the military, and I'm proud of the commander. Tommy has done everything we've asked. He is fulfilling the mission with patience and discipline and success. He's a down-to-earth, no-nonsense guy. Precisely the kind of man we need to lead a complex mission such as this.

You know, a couple of months ago, a lot of people said that this administration and our military really weren't sure what we were doing. But I had confidence all along. And the reason why I did -- confidence in the success of what we set out to do -- was because I had a chance to be briefed by Tommy Franks on the strategy and on the plan, and on how we were going to use our United States military. And he hasn't let us down. The country needs to be proud of the military, and one reason that I'm so pleased to welcome Tommy, is to be able to say that out loud in Tommy's presence.

So I'm going to have Tommy say a few words, and then we'll be glad to answer a couple of questions.

GENERAL FRANKS: Thank you, Mr. President. As the President said, my wife and I recently have had an opportunity to be with a bunch of great young people -- soldiers and sailors, airmen, Marines -- in the front-line states around Afghanistan and in Afghanistan, and Kandahar and at Camp Rhino and up in Kabul. We had a chance to meet with these young people who are doing the work for the nation.

We also had a chance to attend the installation ceremony in Afghanistan, where we saw Mr. Karzai and members of that team form an interim government in Afghanistan, where for the first time in decades, more than 26 million people will have an opportunity to have their way represented in that government.

And the combination of seeing these great young people and seeing this momentous event just filled me with a desire to be able to brief the President on what's going on over there in the theater, on what our people are doing, how they feel about what they're doing.

And so, Mr. President, thanks very much for having me out here in Crawford.

THE PRESIDENT: You bet.

Scott.

Q Mr. President, what's your reaction to the new bin Laden tape this week? And do you fear he's now alluded the manhunt? Also, are you concerned that if military tribunals require a unanimous verdict for the death penalty, some terrorists could avoid execution?

THE PRESIDENT: Let me start with the first of your three questions. Which was what? I've already forgotten.

Q What's your reaction to the bin Laden tape. Are you afraid he's alluded the manhunt.

THE PRESIDENT: Oh, the tape, yes. I didn't watch it all. I saw snippets of it on TV. You know, it's -- who knows when it was made. Secondly, he is not escaping us. This is a guy who, three months ago, was in control of a county. Now he's maybe in control of a cave. He's on the run.

Listen, a while ago I said to the American people, our objective is more than bin Laden. But one of the things for certain is we're going to get him running and keep him running, and bring him to justice. And that's what's happening. He's on the run, if he's running at all.

So we don't know whether he's in a cave with the door shut, or a cave with the door open -- we just don't know. There's all kinds of reports and all kinds of speculation. But one thing we know is that he's not in charge of Afghanistan anymore. He's not in charge of the -- he's not the parasite that invaded the host, the Taliban. We know that for certain. And we also know that we're on the hunt, and he knows that we're on the hunt. And I like our position better than his.

In terms of whether or not the tribunals will be able to render the justice necessary, that -- I spoke to the Secretary of Defense today about the story in the newspaper. Evidently, somebody in our government wanted to show off to his family, or her family, in between Christmas and New Year's by leaking information in the press that he or she thought would be helpful to the government. The truth of the matter is the Secretary of Defense hadn't even seen the report that was on the front page of America's newspapers.

So my answer to your question, Scott, is I know that the leaked report is preliminary, that they're still in discussions about how best to bring justice. But one thing is for certain, that whatever the procedures are for the military tribunals, our system will be more fair than the system of bin Laden and the Taliban. That is for certain. The prisoners that we capture will be given a heck of a lot better chance in court than those citizens of ours who were in the World Trade Center or in the Pentagon were given by Mr. bin Laden.

David. Good to see you.

Q Good to see you.

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you.

Q Can you say with confidence now that Osama bin Laden in no longer in a position to mastermind another terrorist attack against the United States or our allies? And related to that, you talked about 2002 being a year of war. What can you say to prepare the American people for what that vision is, what they need to be prepared for, as compared to what they've seen in Afghanistan?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I hope 2002 is a year of peace. But I am also realistic, and I know full well that bin Laden and his cronies would like to harm America again, bin Laden and his cronies would like to harm our allies. How do I know that? I receive intelligence reports on a daily basis that indicates that that's his desires. And therefore, the United States must be vigilant, must make sure we continue to focus on our homeland security measures, must disrupt, must use our intelligence-gathering network to prevent the enemy from attacking.

And so, while I hope 2002 is a year of peace, I'm realistic. As to whether or not bin Laden is in control of some network, who knows? The thing we're certain about is that he's on the run, that he's hiding in caves, if hiding at all. And the other thing I'm certain about is we will bring him to justice. I don't know whether it's going to be tomorrow, but Tommy will tell you that I haven't said, Tommy, get him tomorrow. I said, just get him. And we will. We will bring him to justice.

We don't know, David, whether or not he's given any orders to any of his soldiers, but we take nothing for granted. And so our country still remains on alert, and we're actively looking for anybody who would harm America.

The shoe bomber was a case in point, where the country has been on alert. A stewardess on an American Airlines flight -- or a flight attendant on an American Airlines flight was vigilant, saw something amiss, and responded. It's an indication that the culture of America has shifted to one of alertness. And I'm grateful for the flight attendant's response, as I'm sure the passengers on that airplane. But we've got to be aware that there are still enemies to the country. And our government is responding accordingly.

Q Mr. President, do you think that India and Pakistan are sliding toward war?

THE PRESIDENT: One of the things that we discussed today in the national security conference, and I discussed yesterday with members of my national security team, was the India and Pakistan issue. Colin Powell has spoke to both sides today, urging restraint, urging calm. I was pleased to -- I'm pleased to note that President Musharraf has announced the arrest of 50 extreme terrorists -- extremists or terrorists. And I hope India takes note of that, that the President is responding forcefully and actively to bring those who would harm others to justice.

The war on terror is not just an American war on terrorists, it's a civilized government war on terror that we're talking about here. But my government and my administration is working actively to bring some calm in the region, to hopefully convince both sides to stop the escalation of force. And as I say, I'm pleased that President Musharraf is responding to the Indian requests to round up those who would do harm to others and incarcerate them, which he did.

Q Are you making any calls yourself, sir?

THE PRESIDENT: Not yet. I will if need be. As a matter of fact, I have been making calls recently to leaders in our own hemisphere. I spoke to the Presidents of Mexico and Uruguay, Chile and Brazil about the Argentinean situation. I made it clear to those governments that we want to work with them, to work together to make sure that the Argentineans understand that we will support a plan that sustains economic growth. We're willing to offer technical assistance through the IMF; that our government is aware of what's taking place and that we're fully engaged in the issue.

Q Mr. President, some say that the events of 2001 have changed you, while others say that you're the same person you always were --

THE PRESIDENT: Yes.

Q Who's right? Or is it fair to say there's some truth in both arguments?

THE PRESIDENT: Talk to my wife. (Laughter.) I don't know. I don't spend a lot of time looking in the mirror. Except when I comb my hair. And -- listen, I'll give you a hint. I liked coming to the ranch before September the 11th; I like coming to the ranch after September the 11th.

Q -- the war for a moment. Have you had any contact with Ken Lay or other Enron officials in the last six weeks --

THE PRESIDENT: No.

Q -- and do you think that there is something the government should do to help Enron --

THE PRESIDENT: I have had no contact with Enron officials in the last six weeks. Do I think the government ought to help what now?

Q Help Enron or do something to help prevent some of these employees from losing their life savings.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I think the life savings issue is something we need to look into. I think it's very important to understand what took place. The government will be looking into this. I mean, the SEC will be looking into matters, Congress appears to be looking into matters. There will be a lot of government inquiry into Enron and what took place there.

I'm deeply concerned about the citizens of Houston who worked for Enron who lost life savings. It's very troubling to read the stories about those who locked up Enron stock -- had their Enron stock locked up in their 401K plans, and then saw their savings dissipate. I think it's very important for us to fully understand the why's of Enron. And there will be plenty of investigations.

Q Sir, will you make recess appointments --

THE PRESIDENT: Thinking about it. I don't know yet. I'm right now focused on the military operations in Afghanistan and giving Tommy a tour of my ranch. But I, at the appropriate time, will take a good, hard look at recess appointments.

I'm disappointed that a lot of my appointments were stalled in the United States Senate, weren't given a hearing. This Scalia man got out of committee, but never given a vote on the floor of the Senate. He's a good fellow, he ought to be approved. But I'll take a good, hard look at all the options available to me.

Q Mr. President, is there a timetable in your mind for withdrawing U.S. troops from Afghanistan? Or as long as bin Laden is still on the run, do you imagine them being there indefinitely?

THE PRESIDENT: I imagine us being there for quite a long period of time. But my timetable is going to be set by Tommy Franks. Tommy is in charge of the military operations; he's in charge of the military. I'll let Tommy speak for himself, but I will tell you this -- we won't be making political decisions about what to do with our military.

I gave Tommy a mission; it was a well-defined mission. And Tommy is in charge of getting that mission done, and when Tommy says, "Mission complete, Mr. President," that's when we start moving troops out. But until he says that, I am -- I will make the case to the American people that we're doing the right thing.

Q What's your definition of the mission being complete in Afghanistan, sir?

THE PRESIDENT: In Afghanistan? Well, Taliban gone, the country secure, the country stable, that al Qaeda cells rounded up, Taliban fighters brought to justice. The over 6,000 troops, prisoners being held -- prisoners of war being held by our allies interrogated, finger-printing. I mean, there's a lot to do. And the American people just must understand when I said that we need to be patient, that I meant it. And we're going to be there for a while. And I don't know the exact moment when we leave, David, but it's not until this mission is complete.

The world must know that this administration will not blink in the face of danger, and will not tire when it comes to completing the missions that we said we would do. The world will learn that when the United States is harmed, we will follow through. The world will see that when we put a coalition together that says, "join us," I mean it. And when I ask others to participate, I mean it. And in order to lead the coalition, we must show that we will complete the mission. And part of that mission is, as Tommy will tell you, is to make sure that Afghanistan is a stable country.

And he's got a lot to say on that if you want him to talk about it. Okay, bring the man to the Mike.

Q General Franks, could you talk about how you took evasive action when you were fired upon the other day? There was a report yesterday that your helicopter was fired upon.

Q You should get right to that, sir, after you do the first question. (Laughter.)

GENERAL FRANKS: Let me take that -- let me take your question first. As we look around, today we have more than 50 nations involved in this coalition effort, and around Afghanistan, providing support and so forth. We have 26 nations represented at our headquarters down in Tampa, Florida. We have 16 nations represented on the ground or in the air or at sea around Afghanistan.

And it's interesting that over the past 10 days, the numbers I've just described have grown rather than shrinking. I think the view is that Afghanistan is a part of a global effort against terrorism, that we'll stay in Afghanistan as long as it takes to do what the President has said. We will do away with the Taliban, and that has been done. We now have a legitimate interim government in Kabul.

We will destroy the al Qaeda terrorist network inside Afghanistan. We will take care of the screening and the work that needs to be done with all these detainees -- finger-printing, DNA work, photography, screening, interrogation. We'll determine which ones need to be brought out and need to be handled in some form of legal process.

How long will that take? I think the President said it immediately after the 11th of September, and I think many of us have said it about every day since then: It will take as long as it takes.

Interesting to me, the fact that these young people standing at Kandahar Airport a few nights ago, in the middle of the night, watching the USO show, showed me absolutely no desire to leave their mission at all. And so, I think it's best for all of us to recognize that we will not be hurried, we will not be pressed into doing something that does not represent our national objectives. And we will take as long as it takes.

And a very short answer to the business of the helicopter -- I have been told since I took that helicopter ride that someone took a shot at the helicopter. I didn't see it when it happened, and I believe it may have happened, but then again, this is Afghanistan and we have pockets of Taliban still in that country. And that's one of the reasons that we're going to stay there until we have mopped all that up.

Q Mr. President --

THE PRESIDENT: Yes. It's your big day, Scott, two questions.

Q A one-part question this time, I promise.

THE PRESIDENT: Four questions, excuse me. (Laughter.)

Q Would you prefer to see bin Laden captured and questioned about the attacks and possible future attacks?

THE PRESIDENT: You know, dead or alive is fine with me.

Q Mr. President, you mentioned Argentina and you talked about you support more technical assistance from the IMF for them. Would you support more money for Argentina from the IMF, or has the well kind of run dry there?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, it depends upon what Argentina decides to do. The key for Argentina is to get her fiscal house in order, get monetary policy in order, and to develop a plan that will show sustained economic vitality and economic growth. But it's up to Argentina on how to develop the plan. As you know, there's been an interim government in place, there will be elections in a couple of months. And the point we've made to the Argentinean government, as well as to our friends in the region, is that we will be willing to help them develop the plan, if they ask for technical advice. It will all be done through the IMF.

But the first order of business is for the Argentineans to develop a plan to show us how they're going to get their house in order. They've got a lot of work to do, but -- and all of us that are concerned about Argentina are willing to work together to get the job done. There was near unanimity on my phone calls to the other leaders in the region that -- of the course of action that I just laid out.

Q Have you decided that anybody should be subjected to a military tribunal?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, Americans shouldn't, as you know. I mean, I excluded any Americans.

Q Of the prisoners, have you decided that any one --

THE PRESIDENT: Oh, have I made any decisions yet? Not at all, not yet, Dave. We're still -- I still want to make sure that the -- I still want to see what the Secretary of Defense recommends as to how to proceed. He has -- as I said, he hasn't seen the now famous document that some American decided to leak.

I don't know why people do that. I guess either to make you feel good, and-or to make themselves feel good. But, nevertheless, it was not very helpful. And as the Secretary of Defense said, he hasn't even seen the document yet. But they're working through, and we're working through, as you know, all the other types of cases that have come forward. I mean, as Tommy said, there's a lot of people to be questioned, and there's also a lot of decisions to be made as to how to run these folks through our system. And we're just not quite there yet. We've got time.

Q What about Walker?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, same situation. We've got time. And Walker is well-berthed on a U.S. warship. It's a heck of a lot more comfortable on that ship than he was in the basement of that prison. When he decided -- when he was captured, Walker made a terrible decision, and our system is such that he'll have proper justice. But he's working with the enemy, and we'll see how the courts deal with that.

Q Sir, were you upset that that Secret Service agent was kept off that plane? Because you have been saying this --

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, I was. I talked to the man this morning. I told him how proud I was that he was by my side. He's here on the ranch, and he's guarding me. And, of course, I was. We'll let the facts -- they're going to get the facts out. There's an inquiry going on as to specifically what took place. But if he was treated that way because of his ethnicity, that will make me madder than heck.

Q There are increasing news reports that bin Laden escaped to Pakistan --

THE PRESIDENT: Oh, yeah? Well, sorry to interrupt your question, but if you'd asked me the question yesterday, you would have said there's increasing news reports that he's dead, and the day before, that he's hiding in a cave. In other words, there's increasing speculation about bin Laden. But what one shouldn't speculate on is if he's alive, he's on the run. And you don't need to worry about whether or not we're going to get him, because we are. And it's just a matter of time.

I mean, I've read reports where he died his hair red. That's not going to stop us from finding him.

Q But what assurances have you gotten from President Musharraf that if that is the case, that he'll find him and turn him --

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I appreciate that. President Musharraf has been very helpful. Tommy has visited with him, I visited with him, the Secretary of Defense has visited with him. And he said he will help in all matters. And we believe he'll help with Mr. bin Laden, too, if, in fact, he happens to be in Pakistan. Who knows where he is. But one thing is for certain; he's on the losing side of a rout. And the other thing for certain is we're not going to stop until we get him and all those murderers that are associated with him.

And who knows how many we've gotten to date, because we're gathering evidence. We don't know whether some of those people are in those caves. And Tommy did a fine job of shutting them down. They may still be locked up in there. And as you know, we're sending troops up in that region to take a look at some of the caves to find out what's in there. And we're going to have to dig some of them out.

But as time will go on, we will know more and more about how successful we've been. The point is, is that we are going to be there for a while. I'm patient. The commander on the ground is executing the plan, and the American people are in strong support of what's taking place.

Listen, thank you all for being here today. It's great to see you. Welcome back to Prairie Chapel Ranch, and maybe we'll get you back out here before the New Year's. If not, happy New Year. Thank you.

Q What are you doing for New Year's?

THE PRESIDENT: Probably going to bed early. (Laughter.)_

Q What are you doing with your days here?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I'm up -- I was up this morning at 5:00 a.m., spent a little quality time with the First Lady. And I just finished my book, Theodore Rex, by Edmund Morris, which is a fabulous book on Teddy Roosevelt. I recommend people reading it. I am going to -- I would have gotten up and run three or four miles this morning, which I'll probably do that this afternoon. I'm going to take Tommy around to show him parts of the ranch. But if Tommy weren't here, I'd be working down there, a little chain-saw work, clearing some brush, burning some brush.

We're making great progress in one of our -- one of the bottom areas that was heretofore relatively inaccessible. One of these days I'll take you down there. It's a beautiful place. It's a bodark grove -- bodark tree is a native tree, real hard wood that grows these giant green, kind of apple-looking things. But I'll spend time doing that.

And then this afternoon -- it gets dark here about 5:30 p.m., and so I'll probably watch a little University of Texas football tonight.

Q What about the tree you planted yesterday?

THE PRESIDENT: Tree plant, very good. My senior staff gave me a beautiful oak, 10-inch oak. And we planted her right outside the house. I haven't written my thank-you note yet, so I'll give them a verbal -- thanks for the tree. It is a beauty. And we planted about -- I think we planted so far about 35 trees, live oaks and cedar elms here. And it's going to be a beautiful sight for when these trees -- when they take off.

Did a little fishing yesterday, by the way. Not very successful. The water is cold, the fish are at the bottom. They're not biting very much. But just the fact that I was able to fish was a nice treat.

Thank you all.

END 10:23 A.M. CST

Passengers and crew members subdued and sedated Reid, 28, when he tried to light his shoes, and the plane was diverted from its original destination of Miami, Florida, to Boston, Massachusetts.

Since his arrest last Saturday, Reid has been under suicide watch at a prison in Plymouth, Massachusetts, about 40 miles south of Boston.

Cronin, the only witness to testify during Friday's probable-cause hearing, said an explosives expert told her that if the explosive in the sneakers had been detonated against the outside wall of the plane, it would have blasted a hole in the fuselage.

Reid's shoes allegedly contained several bomb-related materials including the explosive PETN, plastic chemicals to gel and mold the explosives and TATP, a highly sensitive material needed to detonate the shoe bombs, sources told CNN. Reid also had a safety fuse containing black powder, a U.S. government official said.

Partly based on Cronin's testimony and the conclusion that Reid posed a flight risk, U.S. District Judge Judith Dein denied bail for the British national and ordered that he be held in custody for further hearings.

Reid has had previous run-ins with the law, U.S. Attorney Michael Sullivan said in a news conference Friday.

Another federal prosecutor "indicated on public record that (Reid) has double-digit convictions on his record," Sullivan said. "He didn't describe what those convictions were for, except it was crimes against persons and crimes against property."

The British Home Office said Friday that Reid twice stayed at Feltham Young Offenders Institution in West London -- for 10 days in 1992 and one month in 1994. It was not known Friday what charges led to Reid's incarceration there.

Two public defenders appointed for Reid said they have seen no government evidence linking Reid to any terrorist group.

But Brixton Mosque chairman Abdul Haqq Baker said both Reid and Zacarias Moussaoui, the only person so far charged with conspiracy in the September 11 terrorist attacks on the United States, attended the same south London mosque in late 1998 and early 1999.

Some al Qaeda detainees in Afghanistan claimed to recognize Reid when U.S. interrogators showed them his picture, officials said. But authorities cautioned that they have no independent confirmation linking Reid to any terrorist organization.

Reid told the FBI that he made the shoe bombs himself, a U.S. government official said.

Sullivan said "there was no credible evidence to suggest there was an accomplice" aiding Reid on Flight 63. Other officials have suggested the explosive's "very, very sophisticated" nature suggest Reid did not act alone.

The suspect's father, Robin Reid, told a British newspaper Friday that his son was "determined enough" to commit suicide but would never have harmed others unless he was "brainwashed."

Israeli government officials said Reid traveled to this Middle Eastern country for "around 10 days" in July before apparently heading by land to Egypt. Reid then moved to Amsterdam, where he worked as a dishwasher at several restaurants between August through November, according to French and Belgian authorities.

After a 10-day stay in Belgium, Reid apparently traveled by train to Paris on December 16. Six days later -- and one day after being turned aside by airport officials -- he boarded Flight 63 in Paris.