President Bush has spent the week rallying international support for a long war in Afghanistan, but Britain's Economist warns that Washington's public relations effort may be too little too late. "In Europe, support for the war is slipping," the magazine writes. "In the Middle East, opposition appears to be mounting." It warns that despite new and creative propaganda efforts by Washington, success depends on enlisting Arab and Muslim spokesmen to dress down bin Laden.
Britain: Frustration at Downing Street
The Guardian reports that British cabinet ministers are privately expressing frustration over Washington's handling of the war. "There is concern on both the military and diplomatic fronts over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; the bombing strategy; perceived lack of U.S. consultation with its allies; and insufficient U.S. focus on the humanitarian crisis," the paper reports. "The British government is also intent on opposing the expansion of the war beyond Afghanistan and is horrified at elements within the Pentagon pushing for an all-out assault on Iraq. The handling of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the main source of dispute, with Downing Street and the Foreign Office worried that dithering in Washington in its handling of the peace process risks alienating Arab opinion, which is seen as crucial in the coalition against terrorism."
Indonesia: Don't take us for granted
Pakistan's General Pervez Musharraf obviously felt secure enough to leave home this week, but has spent much of his international trip repeating his call for a bombing pause during Ramadan — even though he knows it won't happen. His concerns clearly resonate in the Muslim world. An editorial in Indonesia's Jakarta Post warns that "increasingly, people from predominantly Muslim countries are heeding the Taliban's call for a jihad, even if they deplore the radical brand of Islam that the Taliban have imposed on Afghanistan." The paper warns that "Washington cannot take international public opinion, which is still overwhelmingly behind the U.S.-led war against terror, for granted if the bombing in Afghanistan continues. Countries may still support the war against terrorism, but many, like Indonesia, disapprove of the means."
Al Jazeera: Not the Capital Gang
Ground zero of the propaganda war has been inaccessible to most Americans — Qatar's Al Jazeera cable TV network, the single most important opinion-maker in the Arab world, broadcasts only in Arabic. But Boston NPR station WBUR is now offering Americans a peek at what the Arab world is hearing through its daily translations of Al Jazeera's news broadcasts. While much of the reportage comes straight from the wires, Taliban spin gets a lot more air than it would in the U.S. Example: "The Taliban say the U.S.-led campaign is a crusade against Islam and claim it has already killed more than 1,500 people, many of them civilians, according to Reuters. Washington says these figures are exaggerated and has ridiculed the claims, despite confirmations by the U.N. and other sources of off-target bombs killing many civilians." The network says it is simply reporting both sides' claims. But Arabic-speaking U.S. officials recently sent to counter Bin Laden on the network may be waging an uphill battle when news reports include lines such as "Humanitarian aid groups have asserted that the continuation of the U.S.-led war will lead to a catastrophe on a colossal scale when winter arrives."
Pakistan: Fears of an Afghan partition
Reports from the ground war are looking a lot more promising. Al Jazeera and others report that the Northern Alliance is advancing on the Taliban at Mazar-i-Sharif, and inflicting heavy casualties. Pakistan's Frontier Post believe the Alliance is getting an opportunity to redeem its recent bad rap from the media. Military realities have made it a central cog of the U.S. war effort, the paper argues, and stepped up air support has raised the possibility of the Alliance capturing Mazar before the onset of winter. That "could provide the U.S. forces with a bridgehead or land corridor from Uzbekistan to ferry troops and supplies into Afghanistan, an advantage Pakistan cannot and has not offered because of domestic political constraints." The danger, of course, is de facto partition of Afghanistan, "a prospect no Afghan patriot contemplates with enthusiasm or equanimity. However, that may well be the bitter reality that will have to be swallowed, at least until there are signs, not visible so far, of some internal weakening of the Taliban and/or defections from the Pushtuns backing them."
Israel: Going through the motions
The other major theme of Week 5 at war was that hardy perennial, Middle East peace. There was Tony Blair in Washington cajoling President Bush, and Israel withdrawing from recently reoccupied West Bank towns. But the Israeli media was seized by reports that foreign minister Shimon Peres was urging Ariel Sharon to come up with a long-term peace plan of his own, rather than be forced to respond to anyone else's. The Jerusalem Post reported mounting domestic opposition to a Sharon-Peres peace proposal from both the left and the right. The Labor Party rank-and-file is pushing for unilateral separation, while Sharon's Likud want no more talk of a Palestinian state. But the discussion is irrelevant, says Haaretz correspondent Akiva Eldar, because there is no peace plan. Nor will there be. "The gaps between Sharon and Peres concerning the final status settlement are unbridgeable," he quotes a cabinet minister as telling him.
Chile: Wash with Osama
The most bizarre media moment of the week was not Washington's tapping as its propaganda chief an advertising executive famous for selling Head and Shoulders shampoo and Uncle Ben's rice. No, that distinction would surely go to reports that Chilean businessman Eduardo Mateluna plans to launch a line of soaps and air fresheners called, simply, "Osama." Explained Mateluna, who has previously marketed wines named after General Augusto Pinochet, "It's a name that people already know."