Nick Denton writes:
“And that was before the missiles went astray this morning, apparently killing as many as 15 people. Hell, 15 dead: that’s a quiet day in the Arab world. Even imagining the United States was targeting civilians, its efforts are laughable compared with Saddam — 5,000 dead in the chemical attack on Halabja in one day — or Assad — 30,000 shelled to death in Hama — or pretty much any other Arab ruler”
1. Not a good idea to lump all Arab governments together with Saddam’s.
2. This analogy is equivalent to using the fact that there are more people killed by guns in the US every year than in the attack on the World Trade Center to justify an anti-gun stance comparing the NRA to terrorists. No matter what your stance on gun control this would be morally offensive.
As the US government says, it is really important to go the extra mile to distinguish the Iraqi people from their government and Arabs from the activities of terrorists, but what this includes is not creating statements which are likely to be perceived by some Arabs as a failure to do this. This is called tact – or in government circles, diplomacy.