Segacs’s World I Know

The latest polls are predicting a possible Liberal victory in Monday’s election:

It is the second survey within 24 hours pointing to a big shift in public opinion in Canada’s mainly French-speaking province in favor of the Liberals.

The results show support for the Liberals up 8 percentage point from a mid-campaign CROP poll. Backing for the Parti Quebecois is down 6 points.

“Should these numbers hold until the election, the Liberals will certainly form the next government,” CROP Vice-President Claude Gauthier told the Globe and Mail. “We might even be witnessing a wave of support for the Liberals that could go up as high as 50 percent of the vote.”

All I can say is, don’t count your chickens before they hatch. The Liberals may well win the popular vote – in fact, it’s almost a guarantee that they will. But the PQ still has a very high chance of forming the government – even a majority government.

I’ve never understood why polls aren’t released by riding. That would be a much more accurate picture of what is likely to happen on election day.

Some groups are pushing to get Al-Jazeera broadcast in Canada. The CJC and B’nai Brith Canada are incensed – rightly so. Far from being “just another viewpoint”, Al-Jazeera broadcasts blatantly antisemitic content on a daily basis under the guise of news:

CJC President Keith Landy, whose group closely monitors Al-Jazeera programming, said that some of the channel’s material might violate Canada’s hate-crimes legislation and federal broadcasting statutes, since it regularly engages in “blatant anti-Semitism, Holocaust denial and the glorification of suicide bombers.”

“We certainly don’t want this to appear as a political attempt to prevent another view from being aired,” he said. “But by granting them a license, the kind of stories that they carry could contravene the Criminal Code.”

Arab groups in Canada have vowed to push for the channel’s inclusion on Canadian cable service, saying that “it would broaden the horizon of the Canadian public” with regards to the Middle East.

What, the CBC isn’t enough for them?

No weapons of mass destruction in Iraq? Oh yeah?

U.S. Marines may have found weapons-grade plutonium in a massive underground facility discovered beneath Iraq’s Al Tuwaitha nuclear complex, an embedded reporter told Fox News Thursday.

[ . . . ]

So far, Marine nuclear and intelligence experts have found 14 buildings that have high levels of radiation, Prine reported Thursday.

His report noted that some of the tests have found nuclear residue too deadly for human contact.

The Marine radiation detectors go “off the charts” a few hundred meters outside the nuclear compound, where locals say “missile water” is stored in enormous caverns, reported Prine, who is embedded with the U.S. 1st Marine Division.

If this does turn out to be a nuclear weapons facility, then the situation was even worse than most people imagined. It was assumed that Saddam had an abundance of biological and chemical weapons, but nobody thought he was actually nearing nuclear capability (though not for lack of trying), since the Israelis destroyed the Osirak reactor in 1981.

Was this strike to outst Saddam just in time? (Via LGF).

Israel took out a top leader of the Islamic Jihad in a targeted attack today.

This on the same day as an attack by the Al-Aksa Brigades and the PFLP in which two Israeli soldiers were killed and nine others wounded while they slept in their tents.

The situation in Israel is heating up unfortunately, while the world’s attention is focused on Iraq. As both sides face the possibility that the Western world (namely the U.S.) will begin pressuring them to accept the “road map”, I fear more terror attacks by Palestinian fringe groups who will do anything to make sure that doesn’t happen. It seems like every time the United States gets involved in pressing for peace in the region, all that results is more violence.

The Iraqis may have been dancing in the streets, but to the Palestinians this was a crushing blow. Most supported Saddam; many believed that his forces would fight and resist fiercely against American and coalition forces.

“This is a sad day for all the Arabs and Muslims, particularly the Palestinians,” Nael al-Am, a Ramallah grocer who keeps a poster of Saddam Hussein in his shop, told the Jerusalem Post.

“I invested a lot of money in buying a satellite dish and a new TV set because I wanted to watch the day the battle for Baghdad begins. I was sure this was going to be one of the great battles of the century, where an Arab army would inflict heavy losses on the invading crusaders. I feel as if a dagger has been stuck in my heart when I see American soldiers strolling in the heart of Baghdad.”

This was hardly the jubilant scenes that were filmed yesterday in Baghdad. And no wonder. The Palestinians haven’t had to live under Saddam’s brutal rule. Instead, the Iraqi regime has been funding Palestinian terror against Israel. To most Palestinians, Saddam Hussein was a symbol of Muslim resistance against Americans. And watching him fall – especially after swallowing the big talk and lies from their local media telling them that Saddam’s victory was assured – was a brutal disappointment.

Anyone who thinks that something good is bound to come of this within Palestinian society is, unfortunately, delusional. To the Palestinians, this is yet one latest in a long string of letdowns from lofty promises that they believed from various leaders. Many saw Arafat as their path to peace, glory, and a Palestinian state on all of Israel’s territory. When that didn’t materialize, many turned to other leaders – such as Hamas or Islamic Jihad – all promising spoils. And these same people were cruelly misled by Saddam Hussein’s big talk of being able to defend Iraq and simultaneously help the Palestinian people fight Israel.

It’s a shame, because the Palestinian people deserve better. They deserve leaders who will tell them the truth, not lie to them while using them as pawns on a chessboard.

They did everything they could to prevent this war, but now France is “rejoicing” at the fall of Saddam:

But [Chirac] said in a statement released by the Elysee Palace Thursday: “France, like every democracy, is rejoicing over the collapse of Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship, and hopes for a quick and effective end to the battle.”

His foreign minister, Dominique de Villepin, added: “With the collapse of Saddam Hussein’s regime, a dark page has been turned.”

The French daily newspaper La Liberation focused on the causes of the war, saying: “The successful military campaign in Iraq can only reassure the powerful U.S. that its vision of the world must be the right one.

Everyone loves to hop on the bandwagon of a winner. The war ain’t over yet, but France certainly seems to be changing its tune.

Eggleton speaks out in defense of Israel:

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to address the anti-Israel petition that was filed in the House on March 31 by the member for the riding of Quebec.

There is no connection between Israel’s struggle with suicide bombers and Saddam Hussein’s many years of non-compliance with UN inspections. Israel is a democracy and an ally in our campaign on terrorism.

The fundamental cause of the ongoing crisis in the disputed territories is the reluctance of the Palestinian side to accept Israeli existence, to renounce a strategy of terrorism and compromise, something that I hope will happen with the new Palestinian prime minister.

Israel has the responsibility to protect its people from suicide bombers. It is careful to minimize civilian casualties, and the allegations of Israeli massacres are fabrications.

Israel proved its commitment to peace at Camp David in July 2000 when it put forward a two state solution. Yasser Arafat responded with a strategy of violence. Terrorism cannot bring peace to this region, and Canada must stand by its Israeli allies in our campaign against this global threat.

This statement was published by the CJC as part of its regular reporting on issues discussed in Parliament that affect its constituents. It’s nice to see someone besides the Canadian Alliance making a strong pro-Israel statement for a change.

Here’s more about the CSU elections, from the Canadian Jewish News. The print edition also has an opinion piece by Simon Bensimon of Hillel Montreal.

Today’s been quite a day, as the Americans and coalition forces made themselves at home in Baghdad, celebrating the end of Saddam Hussein’s regime.

I can’t help thinking of Churchill’s famous words in 1942 though: “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.” U.S. forces are warning us that the war isn’t over. And even after the guns and bombs stop, the toughest challenges still lie ahead.

Today was a good day, though, all in all.