The Jerusalem Post is defiantly sarcastic in its response to indignation over the presumptive Mossad use of forged passports.

The pigheaded refusal to acknowledge that sometimes the ends justify the means reflects Europe’s moral impoverishment.

Dahu Khalfan Tamim now has a world-class reputation for detective work. The head of the Dubai police swiftly determined that Hamas’s Mahmoud Mabhouh did not die of natural causes at the five-star Bustan Rotana Hotel on Jan. 20. He was assassinated.

Let’s for the sake of argument grant that Israel did away with Mabhouh; that he was not killed by Iran or over some intra-Palestinian dispute, and that clues pointing to Israeli culpability are genuine.

Mabhouh certainly deserved to be assassinated by Israel. Hamas declared war on Israel. And he co-founded its military wing and was personally involved in the (separate) 1989 killings of IDF soldiers Ilan Sa’adon and Avi Sasportas.

Mabhouh was a key link in the unlawful syndicate which delivers Iranian weapons to Gaza. He was apparently tasked with importing an arsenal that would make life hellish for Israelis living in metropolitan Tel Aviv. He was, perhaps, Hamas’s equivalent to Hizbullah’s Imad Mughniyeh, whose car blew up in Damascus two years ago.

You can tell a great deal about the moral compass and political leanings of a society by observing its reaction to the Mabhouh liquidation.

There is unease in Europe because the purported assassins identified by Dubai were travelling under forged French, German, Irish and British passports; and identities of Israelis with dual-citizenship were utilized.

Even The Times of London, whose editorial page has been sympathetic toward Israel, expressed chagrin over the affair, saying this country had shown poor regard for the “future security of British passport holders overseas.” Frankly, there is little reason to think that the tradecraft employed in this assassination – which we will not second guess at this stage – jeopardizes anyone.

Actually, what troubles us is the question of whose passport Mabhouh was traveling under and why he was allowed to enter neutral Dubai on gun-running business.

Of course, that’s not how the British see it. The BBC’s Jeremy Bowen warned that if Israel had used British passports for “nefarious” purposes – meaning sending Mabhouh to his Maker – Bowen expected, or would it be more accurate to say, hoped for, “a crisis” in relations betweenLondon and Jerusalem.

The Guardian quoted a Foreign Office mandarin as gloating: “Relations were in the freezer before this. They are in the deep freeze now.” The paper then grumbled about the British government’s “supine” response to the assassination, editorializing against the government’s proposal to lift the threat of lawfare. The Guardian wants visiting Israeli ministers to continue to worry about facing Palestinian-inspired “war crimes” charges.

With the British media delighting in the assassination-passport kerfuffle – a Daily Mail headline screamed: “Dragged into a Mossad murder plot” – Menzies Campell, a routinely anti-Israel elder of the Liberal Democrats, declared that “Israel has some explaining to do.”

An anyway beleaguered Prime Minister Gordon Brown intoned: “We have got to carry out a full investigation into this. The British passport is an important document that has got to be held with care.” Sentiments echoed by Opposition Leader David Cameron. ...

Perhaps the shrill reaction in some (though certainly not all) British quarters is not rooted purely in anti-Israelism. Chances are that at least parts of the British intelligentsia and media would have reacted similarly if the man in that hotel room had been Osama bin Laden… or Adolf Eichmann.

One has to admire especially the delightfullly humorous, cat-ate-the-canary “Just for the sake of argument, let’s assume that Israel did away with Mabhouh” line. I bet that champagne corks are popping still in secluded rest and recreation facilities used by Mossad operatives obliged by circumstances to remain in hiding and out of the public eye.

Of course, the Jerusalem Post is perfectly correct. The British and European press ought to be editorializing piously about how naughty people who traffic in weapons used to attack innocent civilians need to expect to come to premature ends at the hands of persons unknown, instead of striking poses of feigned indignation over the profaned sanctity of travel identification documents.

That Skull and Bones balloting box was not actually sold. Apparently, Christie’s withdrew it from the sale late last month, IvyGate reports, after receiving a mysterious “title claim.” The Russell Trust has plenty of lawyers.

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Hot Air (one of the most important conservative blogs) has been sold to Salem Communications. Congratulations and good luck.
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As part of the Carnival celebration, preceding the beginning of Lent, in the Spanish village of Laza, “Peliqueiros” or ancient tax collectors, are portrayed wearing warning cowbells and prepared to beat the villagers with sticks. 39 Carnival photos.

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Stratfor: Tradecraft in Dubai Assassination
3:14 video

Some recent non-Irish visitors to Dubai

The New York Times admired the romantic plot line.

The murder was straight out of a cheap spy thriller. At least 11 professional assassins, some wearing wigs and fake beards, tracked a senior Hamas official to his Dubai hotel in January and killed him with cold precision, fleeing the country afterward on European passports, the Dubai police say.

The Telegraph quoted the Irish government denying the legitimacy of several supposedly Irish passports, and provided details of the assassination.

Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, a senior figure in the military wing of Hamas, was found dead in a hotel room on Jan 20. According to one report he was killed by a female assassin who entered his room by posing as a member of hotel staff, injected him with a drug that induced a heart attack and hung a “Do Not Disturb” sign on the door.

But other officers said he was strangled, probably after receiving an electric shock.

Hamas, the Islamist group that controls Gaza, blamed Israel’s Mossad intelligence service for the killing.

It seems that the late al-Mabhouh played a key role in the smuggling of Iranian rockets to Gaza.
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27:27 Security camera footage of suspected assassins

Two figures in the assembled video have their faces digitized out, why?

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DEBKAfile is taking a vacation!
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the late Mahmoud-al-Mabhouh

I would give the following paper by Amichai Cohen, International Law professor at Ono Academic College, Israel, a gentlemanly C.

Excerpt

Armed conflicts of this type have sometimes been termed “asymmetrical” –- an adjective used principally with reference to the fact that the protagonists are a state, with all its might and force, and an organization with few heavy arms and a limited number of fighters. But such conflicts are also asymmetrical in a more complicated sense: they are fought between a state, in possession of sound reasons for following the laws of armed conflicts (LOAC) or international humanitarian law (IHL), and a high incentive and organizational obligation to do so, on the one hand, and on the other hand, an organization that almost never follows these rules and has very little incentive to do so.

States involved in these conflicts mostly attempt to follow, or are expected by the international community to follow, IHL as detailed in customary international law, in the Geneva Conventions, and in other sources of applicable international law. However, it has become increasingly difficult to abide by these laws, mainly because of the novel nature of the problems that constantly arise. This brief review will only deal with two of the most prominent of such problems:

The first is how to apply the rule forbidding indiscriminate attacks on a civilian population when the enemy deliberately operates from within that environment. Direct attacks against civilians are of course always forbidden. However, what are
the appropriate norms that a state should apply when the only possible way of fighting the enemy involves risking the lives of civilians whom the enemy is using for its own protection?

A second problem arises from the fact that non-state actors are not susceptible to the range of formal and informal sanction which may be used against states. Since international law is not policed effectively, non-state actors may readily assume
that their violations of the laws of war, including those mentioned above, will not be punished by law. For example, they may target civilians of the state actor in the knowledge that there exists very small chance that they will be punished for
doing so by any international judicial body. Consequently, while one side to the conflict behaves in accordance with IHL, the other considers itself to be free of the limitations imposed by these rules.

Read the whole thing.

My criticism is that, although Professor Cohen does a workmanlike academic job of dividing alternative perspectives into models, his fundamental approach is fundamentally far too abstract, unempiric, and ahistoric.

Restricting consideration of the practical responses to terrorism, guerrilla warfare, and violations of the laws and customs of war to a small number of very recent, poorly handled examples which occurred under the leadership of democratic governments, which obviously failed satisfactorily to implement or articulate clear policies, was a fundamental mistake.

The world did not suddenly spring into existence in 1993. “Assymetrical warfare” and the cynical exploitation of the chivalrous instincts and humanitarian values of honorable and civilized armies by outlaws and barbarians has always been part of the human experience. Military commanders from Classical Antiquity down to WWII frequently dealt with decisive effect with the same problems without scandalizing posterity by cruelty and excesses.

Professor Cohen is too satisfied with the classification of perspectives into “models,” and too cautious and timid about identifying explicitly the major and important role played in the fraudulent framing of the issue as presented to the public by dishonest and ideologically biased humanitarian organizations and the media.

Training IDF dog

Haaretz has some fun tauntingly adopting a mock-PC tone while reporting an obviously successful profiling technique as officially denied.

Are IDF dogs trained to pounce all who say ‘God is great’ in Arabic?

The Israel Defense Forces has denied allegations that it trains its canines to attack anybody heard saying Allah Hu Akbar, Arabic for ‘God is great.’

Israeli Arab MK Ahmed Tibi on Monday told the Knesset plenum that at a canine unit ceremony held the day before, parents of the soldiers witnessed demonstrations proving these allegations.

“IDF dogs are trained to pounce and attack any Arab who shouts Allah Hu Akbar, as a Pavlovian reaction,” said Tibi.

Abdulmutallab was concealing a 6” container of PETN in the crotch of this underwear

As this 2:57 ABC video shows, the quantity of explosive was more than sufficient to destroy an airliner.

All this provokes reflection. They are using underwear to hide bombs, concealing high explosive compounds next to their genitals. What is the government going to do now? Will millions of air travelers be stripped naked electronically or literally?
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Jeff Goldberg, in the Atlantic, discussed airline security policies with Bruce Schneier:

Counter­terrorism in the airport is a show designed to make people feel better,” [Schneier] said. “Only two things have made flying safer: the reinforcement of cockpit doors, and the fact that passengers know now to resist hijackers.” This assumes, of course, that al-Qaeda will target airplanes for hijacking, or target aviation at all. “We defend against what the terrorists did last week,” Schnei­er said. He believes that the country would be just as safe as it is today if airport security were rolled back to pre-9/11 levels. “Spend the rest of your money on intelligence, investigations, and emergency response.”

The safest airline in the world, it is widely agreed, is El Al, Israel’s national carrier. The safest airport is Ben Gurion International, in Tel Aviv. No El Al plane has been attacked by terrorists in more than three decades, and no flight leaving Ben Gurion has ever been hijacked. So when US aviation intensified its focus on security after 9/11, it seemed a good bet that the experience of travelers in American airports would increasingly come to resemble that of travelers flying out of Tel Aviv.

But in telling ways, the two experiences remain notably different. For example, passengers in the United States are required to take off their shoes for X-ray screening, while passengers at Ben Gurion are spared that indignity. ...

Nearly five years after Sept. 11, 2001, US airport security remains obstinately focused on intercepting bad things—guns, knives, explosives. ...

Of course the Israelis check for bombs and weapons too, but always with the understanding that things don’t hijack planes, terrorists do—and that the best way to detect terrorists is to focus on intercepting not bad things, but bad people.

Passengers are asked to report three hours before departure. All El Al terminals around the world are closely monitored for security. There are plain-clothes agents and fully armed police or military personnel who patrol the premises for explosives, suspicious behavior, and other threats. Inside the terminal, passengers and their baggage are checked by a trained team. El Al security procedures require that all passengers be interviewed individually prior to boarding, allowing El Al staff to identify possible security threats. Passengers will be asked questions about where they are coming from, the reason for their trip, their job or occupation, and whether they have packed their bags themselves. The likelihood of potential terrorists remaining calm under such questioning is believed to be low (see microexpression). At the check-in counter the passengers’ passports and tickets are closely examined. A ticket without a sticker from the security checkers will not be accepted. At passport control passengers’ names are checked against information from the FBI, Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), Scotland Yard, Shin Bet, and Interpol databases. Luggage is screened and sometimes hand searched. In addition, bags are put through a decompression chamber simulating pressures during flight that could trigger explosives. El Al is the only airline in the world that passes all luggage through such a chamber. Even at overseas airports, El Al security agents conduct all luggage searches personally, even if they are supervised by government or private security firms. ...

Critics of El Al note that its security checks on passengers include racial profiling and have argued that such profiling is unfair, irrational, and degrading to those subject to such screening.

Middle East

The combination of Turkish state-run television’s recently debuted prime-time drama, Ayrilik “Farewell,” depicting Israeli Defence Force soldiers as bloodthirsty war criminals murdering women and children with the announcement of a long-term Turkish strategic alliance with Syria, and the Erdogan government causing the cancellation of NATO military exercises may all be signs of a major and permanent rupture in relations between Turkey and the Western Alliance.

London Times:

Israel’s relations with Turkey plunged to a new low yesterday after Turkish state television aired a fictional series showing troops murdering Palestinian children during last winter’s Gaza war.

Ties between the two strategic regional allies had already taken a serious blow this week when Turkey demanded that Israel be excluded from military exercises that it was staging with US and Nato allies. The US was forced to cancel the war games.

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Caroline Glick thinks we have lost Turkey.

Once the apotheosis of a pro-Western, dependable Muslim democracy, this week Turkey officially left the Western alliance and became a full member of the Iranian axis.

It isn’t that Ankara’s behavior changed fundamentally in recent days. There is nothing new in its massive hostility toward Israel and its effusive solicitousness toward the likes of Syria and Hamas. Since the Islamist AKP party first won control over the Turkish government in the 2002 elections, led by AKP chairman Recip Tayyip Erdogan, the Turks have incrementally and inexorably moved the formerly pro-Western Muslim democracy into the radical Islamist camp populated by the likes of Iran, Syria, Hizbullah, al-Qaida and Hamas. ...

Once the apotheosis of a pro-Western, dependable Muslim democracy, this week Turkey officially left the Western alliance and became a full member of the Iranian axis.

It isn’t that Ankara’s behavior changed fundamentally in recent days. There is nothing new in its massive hostility toward Israel and its effusive solicitousness toward the likes of Syria and Hamas. Since the Islamist AKP party first won control over the Turkish government in the 2002 elections, led by AKP chairman Recip Tayyip Erdogan, the Turks have incrementally and inexorably moved the formerly pro-Western Muslim democracy into the radical Islamist camp populated by the likes of Iran, Syria, Hizbullah, al-Qaida and Hamas.

Spook86 would like to think all this simply represents a diplomatic feint aimed at covering up some impending activities involving Turkish airspace, but I suspect he is too optimistic.

A regular military exercise involving the U.S., Israel, Italy, Turkey (and other NATO elements) was suddenly cancelled last week, just days before it was scheduled to begin.

The U.S. suddenly scrapped plans for the Antolian Eagle drill after Ankara announced plans to pull-out of the exercise, citing participation by Israeli Air Force units. Turkish officials told their counterparts in Tel Aviv they could not abide IAF participation in the exercise, believing the Israeli jets would be the same ones that bombed Palestinian targets in Gaza earlier this year, during Operation Cast Lead.

According to the Jerusalem Post (and Israeli Radio), the final cancellation came after U.S. and other NATO members threatened to pull out if the IAF was not allowed to participate. ...

There is a chance that the new “rift” between Tel Aviv and Ankara in genuine, and rooted in Turkey’s reaction to the Israeli campaign in Gaza. But there is also the very real possibility that the exercise cancellation is a hint of things to come—an operation that may require access to Turkish airspace, without the “formal” approval of the general staff, or the civilian government.

Debkafile, which reported August 29th a leak (apparently from Polish sources) that plans were underway to substitute defense facilities in Turkey and Israel for those originally intended to be sited in Poland and the Czech Republic, is now telling us that Obama has made a deal to site US missile defense systems on a Russian military base in Azerbaijan (!).

DEBKA also, with a note of contempt, reveals that the Israeli based systems is already in place and “working perfectly.”

DEBKA characterizes the Obama Administration’s move as a “surrender to Moscow.”

Marc Garlasco moved from targeting terrorists for the Defense Intelligence Agency to a role as senior military advisor for the leftwing Human Rights Watch.

Garlasco’s new job made him some enemies, and the extensive criticism (example) of Israeli military actions in Garlasco’s reports ultimately provoked some unexpected retaliation.

Omri Ceren, a USC grad student blogging at Mere Rhetoric, on September 8th, exposed Garlasco as a German WWII militaria collector, explicitly associating criticism of Israel with a penchant for collecting Nazi war trophies.

The following day, a Tel Aviv daily, Ma’ariv, quoted the blog posted, describing Garlasco as “a compulsive collector of Nazi insignia and memorabilia.”

Garlasco wrote in his own defense, September 11th, on Huffington Post:

I’ve never hidden my hobby, because there’s nothing shameful in it, however weird it might seem to those who aren’t fascinated by military history. Precisely because it’s so obvious that the Nazis were evil, I never realized that other people, including friends and colleagues, might wonder why I care about these things. Thousands of military history buffs collect war paraphernalia because we want to learn from the past. But I should have realized that images of the Second World War German military are hurtful to many.

I deeply regret causing pain and offense with a handful of juvenile and tasteless postings I made on two websites that study Second World War artifacts (including American, British, German, Japanese and Russian items). Other comments there might seem strange and even distasteful, but they reflect the enthusiasm of the collector, such as gloating about getting my hands on an American pilot’s uniform.

But it appears the politically correct stiletto strike to the kidneys remains one of the most devastatingly effective techniques for incapacitating an opponent in the modern era.

The New York Times today announced that HRW was suspending Garlasco.

A leading human rights group has suspended its senior military analyst following revelations that he is an avid collector of Nazi memorabilia.

The group, Human Rights Watch, had initially thrown its full support behind the analyst, Marc Garlasco, when the news of his hobby came out last week. On Monday night, the group shifted course and suspended him with pay, “pending an investigation,” said Carroll Bogert, the group’s associate director.

“We have questions about whether we have learned everything we need to know,” she said.

Mystery of the Arctic Sea, 8/20

The Telegraph reports Intelligence leaks indicating that the hijacking was done by Mossad (not a peep from Debkafile!) and was done to prevent an unauthorized shipment of advanced Russian air defense missiles from reaching Iran.

Mystery has surrounded the ship, officially carrying a cargo of timber worth £1.3 million from Finland to Algeria, since its crew first reported a boarding in Swedish waters on July 24 after a raid by 10 armed English-speaking men posing as anti-narcotics police officers.

It was eventually recovered off the coast of west Africa on August 17. Russia has since charged eight men from Estonia, Latvia and Russia with kidnapping and piracy.

Russian officials have said the alleged pirates demanded a $1.5 million ransom but speculation has grown that the freighter was carrying contraband cargo.

Israeli and Russian security sources have questioned The Kremlin’s official explanation, instead arguing that the ship was carrying S-300 missiles, Russia’s most advanced anti-aircraft weapon, while undergoing repairs in the Russian port of Kaliningrad, a notorious Baltic smuggling base.

According to reports, Mossad is said to have briefed the Russian government that the shipment had been sold by former military officers linked to the black market, and Russia then dispatched a naval rescue mission. Those who believe Mossad was involved point to a visit to Moscow by Shimon Peres, Israel’s president, the day after the Arctic Sea was recovered.

Crew members of the Arctic Sea have since told Russian news reporters that they have been told not to disclose “state secrets” further fuelling the speculation.

A Russian military source told The Sunday Times: “The official version is ridiculous and was given to allow the Kremlin to save face.

“I’ve spoken to people close to the investigation and they’ve pretty much confirmed Mossad’s involvement. It’s laughable to believe all this fuss was over a load of timber. I’m not alone in believing that it was carrying weapons to Iran.”

S-300PMU2 Favorit

Russian news agency RT News (Moscow) has the same story on this 4:42 video

Debkafile posts a major intelligence leak.

Russia’s Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation (FSB) (Russian: ФСБ, Федеральная служба безопасности Российской Федерации; Federalnaya sluzhba bezopasnosti Rossiyskoy Federaciyi), successor to the NKVD and KGB, has been working with Hezbollah to expose and close down Israeli intelligence operations in Lebanon.

As Debka notes, this development marks a new level of intimacy between Russia’s state security service and the Iran-backed terrorist organization.

Western intelligence sources in the Middle East have disclosed to DEBKAfile that a special unit of the Russian Federal Security Service – FSB, commissioned by Hizballah’s special security apparatus earlier this year, was responsible for the massive discovery of alleged Israel spy rings in Lebanon in recent months with the help of super-efficient detection systems.

Those sources report that the FSB and Hizballah have amassed quantities of undisclosed data on Israel’s clandestine operations in Lebanon and are holding it in reserve in order to leak spectaculars discoveries as and when it suits their purpose.

This disclosure, if borne out, would indicate that the Russian agency, which specializes in counterespionage, is engaged for the first time in anti-Israel activity in the service of an Arab terrorist organization. An Israeli security sources describes this turn of events extremely grave. It also cast an ominous slant on Moscow’s deepening strategic involvement in Syria.

It was generally assumed until now that new electronic devices supplied by France to the Lebanese army were instrumental in uncovering the suspected Israeli spy rings. It now transpires that the Lebanese army was not directly involved; it only detained the suspects handed over by the Shiite Hizballah.

Those same sources disclosed that FSB agents, by blanketing every corner of Lebanon with their sophisticated surveillance systems, were able to detect the spy rings one by one and additionally hack into Israeli intelligence data bases.

Ethan Leib notes that Spain just began a judicial investigation into an Israeli strike on a Hamas leader in Gaza in 2002. Meanwhile, the same Spain released a group of Somali pirates, declining prosecution because the offenses took place “2,000 kilometers away.”

It seems curious that the Spanish view of universal jurisdiction applies to Israel, the late General Pinochet, and officials of the Bush administration, but not to pirates, Especially considering the fact that the whole idea of extra-territorial jurisdiction arose in the first place to justify suppressing piracy.

Hat tip to Walter Olson.

DEBKAFile’s latest rumor ought to be alarming to people residing in Manhattan.

Israel’s AMAN military intelligence director, Maj. Amos Yadlin updated the Knesset foreign affairs and security committee on the state of Iran’s nuclear progress Wednesday, March 25. He reported that although Iran is only months away from a capacity to make a nuclear bomb and has attained a warhead capability, Tehran has decided not to cross the threshold so as to avoid provoking Western retaliation.

DEBKAfile’s military sources report this is not Tehran’s true rationale. The Iranians are held back by two more compelling motives:

1. They will not be satisfied with a single nuclear bomb, but would rather build up an arsenal of 10 to 12 bombs and warheads for which they are short of enough enriched uranium at the moment.

2. Tehran is no longer deterred by fear of an American or European attack, Yadlin explained in his briefing Wednesday. Its leaders are standing by to see what rewards are on offer from US president Barack Obama for improving Washington-Tehran and how they may profit in strategic, diplomatic and economic terms. If the American incentives fall short, Tehran can push ahead with its nuclear weapon. ...

Until now, both Western and Israeli experts maintained Iran has not yet acquired the technology for mounting nuclear warheads on missiles. Yadlin now reveals Tehran is already there, a conclusion reached after the Iranians sent their first earth satellite, Omid, into space on Jan. 3. The launch meant that Iran can deliver nuclear warheads by ballistic missile to any point on earth.

DEBKAFile is a mouthpiece for Israeli Intelliegence. Not all of its reports are accurate. Let’s hope this is one of those which is not.

Greg Pollowitz explains, at National Review Online, that it was not simply Neocon Zionists who torpedoed the Freeman nomination. It was his financial ties to foreign governments (the Saudis and China) and his own extreme statements, particularly those expressing contempt for human rights in China, that did him in.

Meanwhile, David Broder is shedding big, salty tears over the nation’s loss of the services of someone so “thoughtful and obviously smart as hell,” with a special gift for seeing “how situations look to the people on the other side,” particularly when those other people are lining his pockets.

Why, Freeman is so smart, Broder argues, that he would have been able to “explain” Chinese behavior in the recent incident in which Chinese vessels harassed a US intelligence ship in international waters.

I’m sure Freeman would have said that the Chinese were simply re-asserting their national pride after being so cruelly mistreated by the Western powers in the 19th century, and that their making innovative maximalist claims to territorial sovereignty over the South China Sea is a natural expression of their wounded dignity to which we should understandingly concede. Behaving otherwise on our part would be arrogant and provocative. See, Mr. Broder? The country doesn’t need Charles Freeman as head of NIC. I can tell you myself just what he would have said.

Former Saudi Ambassador Charles Freeman said he was throwing himself under the bus, as a form of protest against the nefarious domination of American foreign policy by the International Zionist Conspiracy.

Washington Post:

Charles W. Freeman Jr. withdrew yesterday from his appointment as chairman of the National Intelligence Council after questions about his impartiality were raised among members of Congress and with White House officials.

Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair said he accepted Freeman’s decision “with great regret.” The withdrawal came hours after Blair had given a spirited defense on Capitol Hill of the outspoken former ambassador.

Freeman had come under fire for statements he had made about Israeli policies and for his past connections to Saudi and Chinese interests. ...

In an e-mail sent to friends yesterday evening, Freeman said he had concluded the attacks on him would not end once he was in office and that he did not believe the NIC “could function effectively while its chair was under constant attack.” He wrote that those who questioned his background employed “selective misquotation, the willful distortion of the record . . . and an utter disregard for the truth.”

Such attacks, he said, “will be seen by many to raise serious questions about whether the Obama administration will be able to make its own decisions about the Middle East and related issues.” And he said he regretted that his withdrawal may cause others to doubt the administration’s latitude in such matters.

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But, as Greg Sargent reports, Chuck Schumer is trying to take credit for pushing him.

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Andrew Sullivan finds the process interesting. The debate was in the blogs, not the MSM.

There are a couple of things worth noting about this minor, yet major, Washington spat. The first is that the MSM has barely covered it as a news story, and the entire debate occurred in the blogosphere. I don’t know why. But that would be a very useful line of inquiry for a media journalist.

The second is that Obama may bring change in many areas, but there is no possibility of change on the Israel-Palestine question. Having the kind of debate in America that they have in Israel, let alone Europe, on the way ahead in the Middle East is simply forbidden. Even if a president wants to have differing sources of advice on many questions, the Congress will prevent any actual, genuinely open debate on Israel. More to the point: the Obama peeps never defended Freeman. They were too scared. The fact that Obama blinked means no one else in Washington will ever dare to go through the hazing that Freeman endured. And so the chilling effect is as real as it is deliberate.

Our own original 2/26 posting was one of the earliest.