It's Very Easy To Start A War

After The Allied Victory Of 1918, At The End Of My Father's War, The Victors Divided Up The Lands Of Their Former Enemies. In The Space Of Just Seventeen Months, They Created The Borders Of Northern Ireland, Yugoslavia And Most Of The Middle East. And I Have Spent My Entire Career — In Belfast And Sarajevo, In Beirut And Baghdad — Watching The People Within Those Borders Burn.

Everyone Outside The Roman Empire Was Called A Barbarian. Everyone Outside Obama’s Empire Is Called A Terrorist.

We Love To Think This Fundamentalism And Terrorism Is All About Poverty, And, Of Course, It Has A Connection. You Can See That These People Not Only Are Poor But They Have No Outlets. These Governments Allow No Opposition. So What Do People Do? They Go To Islam. It's The Only Organizational Institution Where They Can Express Their Feelings. But It's Not About Poverty. I've Never Seen A Single Demonstration In Which The People Have Come Out With Signs Saying, "please Give Us Better Roads. Please Give Us New Prenatal Clinics. Please Give Us A New Sewage System."

Even My Landlord, Who Is A Moderate Lebanese Guy, Says, "but Bin Laden Says What We Think." These People Believe That Bin Laden Is Being Targeted Not Because Of The World Trade Center And Washington; They Are Not Convinced By The Evidence That Has Been Produced. They Believe He's Being Targeted Because He Tells The Truth.

I Suppose, In The End, We Journalists Try - Or Should Try - To Be The First Impartial Witnesses Of History. If We Have Any Reason For Our Existence, The Least Must Be Our Ability To Report History As It Happens So That No One Can Say: 'we Didn't Know - No One Told Us.'