Bernadine Healy’s approach was simple. She said, "You don’t belong to a country club that excludes Jews or blacks." All the excuses by representatives of the ICRC that they simply cannot accommodate the Magen David Adom because of the danger of "symbol proliferation" should not obscure this obvious moral truth. Nor should it be forgotten that when Muslims objected to the Christian symbol of the Red Cross, the Red Crescent was added, and when Iran objected to both, a new Red Lion and Sun symbol was allowed for the Iranian member organisation. It was only when the Jewish State asked to be allowed not to use the religious symbols of their former persecutors that it was suddenly discovered nothing could be done.

Healy’s removal prompted The Washington Post to pen an editorial entitled "Hypocrisy wins," and to refer to the current state of affairs at the ICRC as an "abomination". They’re right on both counts.

Meanwhile, Australia’s Red Cross has apparently gone from being on the side of the angels to being in favour of discrimination against Israel. While former Australian Red Cross Secretary-General Jim Carleton refused to follow Dr Healy’s example and withhold dues to the ICRC, he was very active in trying to lobby for and draft changes to ICRC rules that would allow the MDA to join, probably by adopting a new religiously neutral symbol, a red diamond. Despite repeated promises that this solution would be implemented soon, it does not look like happening any time in the near future because of Arab and Muslim opposition. Moreover, with Carleton now gone, the Australian Red Cross’s National Communication Director Andrew Heslop recently told the Jewish News that the "Australian Red Cross supports the 178 member International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies’ position on the question of an additional emblem."

Our Tax Dollars...: Senior figures at Australia’s two public broadcasters used their attendance at an international media conference to argue that the Sept. 11 attacks weren’t that important and too much attention had been paid to them.

According to a report in Britain’s Guardian newspaper, Max Uetricht, director of news and current affairs at the ABC, told the Newsworld Conference of TV Executives at Barcelona that more people were killed in the Srebrenica massacre, and "people were taken out and shot" there in a more horrific manner. He added, it was only "because it was a western capital, the scale seemed bigger."

And SBS Executive Mike Carey complained, "It’s as if terrorism started with New York. We heard the use of the term ‘unprecedented.’ It was only unprecedented because the television cameras were there." For his trouble, Carey managed to earn himself a denunciation in the Wall Street Journal online. Good to see an Australian making a name for himself abroad.

Meanwhile, the BBC has joined Reuters in refusing to call the Sept. 11 attacks "terrorism. According to BBC Deputy News Director Mark Danziger the term is "subjective" and "However appalling and disgusting it was, there will nevertheless be a constituency of your listeners who don’t regard it as terrorism. Describing it as such could downgrade your status as an impartial and independent broadcaster."

In view of this policy, The Review hopes the BBC will now, in the interests of its impartiality, cease its policy of routinely referring to Israeli settlements as "illegal", the West Bank as "Palestinian land" and Israel as "occupying" the Palestinian people, since there are large constituencies both in Israel and abroad which do not regard any of these descriptions as accurate.

But given the entrenched biases of this "impartial and independent broadcaster" we somehow doubt this will happen.

Told You So: It goes without saying that all those "experts" and commentators who brought up the Vietnam analogy and predicted disaster and a quagmire for the US if it moved against the Taliban have been proven wrong, and should have a good look at their assumptions. Ditto for those who predicted a terrible "backlash" in Afghanistan and the Arab world to any US military action — the anger in the Middle Eastern "street" is clearly dissipating (see p. 13.)

Also in need of a bit of self-examination are those who claimed a humanitarian disaster was looming in Afghanistan and called for an end to the bombings so that relief supplies could get in. Aid is now flowing, and the prospects of those Afghanis suffering in poverty are now better than they ever were. The Taliban were always the biggest obstacle to the provision of humanitarian aid, not the American military campaign, as was clear from the situation before Sept. 11.

Finally, it remains amazing to me that there are still people out there doubting the "evidence" that Bin Laden was responsible for the attacks of Sept. 11. Not only has he now moved from all but admitting responsibility to actually confessing in an internal Al-Qaeda video tape obtained by London’s Telegraph, but documents seized in Kabul clearly show both Al-Qaeda and Taliban links to the attacks. The people who are still doubtful now are simply closed to any evidence because of their prejudices. They would not be convinced, even by conviction in the most scrupulous trial known to mankind.