MEDIA REACTION ON IRAQI WMD

UNCLAS AMMAN 000699 SIPDIS STATE FOR NEA/ARN, NEA/PA, NEA/AIA, INR/NESA, R/MR, I/GNEA, B/BXN, B/BRN, NEA/PPD, NEA/IPA FOR ALTERMAN USAID/ANE/MEA LONDON FOR GOLDRICH PARIS FOR O'FRIEL E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: KMDR JO SUBJECT: MEDIA REACTION ON IRAQI WMD Summary -- All papers published today, January 28, highlights developments in Iraq, including the killing of 6 American soldiers and two CNN employees in separate attacks. Front-page reports highlight the postponement of the Israeli Foreign Minister's visit to Jordan, which was scheduled to take place today, for "technical reasons" [there has been a number of protests by parliament deputies about this visit over the past week]. Editorial Commentary -- "Exposed fabrications" Daily columnist Rakan Majali writes on the back-page of center-left, influential Arabic daily Al-Dustour (01/28): "In recent weeks, a number of American and British officials, including Powell's remarks in Moscow, have acknowledged the fact that Iraq does not have any type of weapons of mass destruction. After nine months of Iraq's occupation, it is confirmed that the accusation that Iraq owns dangerous weapons is a fabricated allegation, on which the United States depended to launch a war on Iraq. Furthermore, the United States is pompously determined to prove the allegation against Al-Qaeda organization and that it is responsible for the terrorist crime of 9/11, something that the United States adopted as a pretext for launching war against Afghanistan.. It is funny that the U.S. administration continues to hold on to the accusations against the Moroccan Abdul Ghani Al- Masoudi by saying that the German judiciary has proof of his participation in the 9/11 attacks, when the Germans themselves said that Al-Masoudi is innocent.. The U.S. administration is latching on to lies and fabrications about people, even if they are linked to Al-Qaeda organization. Al-Masoudi's story is not the last of thousands of other stories of prisoners in American and western jails, where America failed after two years of investigations to prove Al-Qaeda's link to the 9/11 attacks." -- "The sand pyramid has begun to fall" Chief Editor Taher Udwan writes on the back-page of independent, mass-appeal Arabic daily Al-Arab Al-Yawm (01/28): "They have made a mountain out of a molehill and they have build a pyramid of allegations and pretexts to justify the invasion and occupation of Iraq. This is the story of Bush and Blair with the Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. But, now that they have managed to achieve their dreams of the empire over the shattered pieces of Iraq and its people, the sand pyramid turns out to be made of elegant lies.. The question is however is: how did the world allow two leaders of two democratic countries to occupy a weaker besieged country and to destroy it under fabricated pretexts and made-up lies, leading the Iraqi people into a state of division, sectarianism and destruction? Now that the pyramid of lies has collapsed, the occupiers are trying to cover themselves with the image of the liberators who have come to save the Iraqi people and give them democracy; another pyramid of lies, for what is happening there is a massacre by all means: a massacre of geography and a massacre of humanity. We just hope that the Iraqis will survive with the least amount of losses." HALE