Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - August 12, 2006, Winnipeg, Manitoba Comment editor Gerald flood 697-7269 a15 Winnipeg free press saturday August 12, 2006 beyond terrorism scare a cynical charade i used to know when i was being deeply cynical when i was it said a Friend who just made it into London before they closed Heathrow Airport for the terrorist scare. Now i Back in february 2003, when prime minister Tony Blair was trying to per Suade a reluctant Britain that invading Iraq alongside the United states was a really neat idea tanks suddenly appeared on the perimeter Road around Heathrow to guard against an impending terrorist attack. It want Clear what they were supposed to do ? crush the terrorists under their treads ? no actual terrorists Ever showed up but it helped to shape pub Lic opinion. So How different is it this time hundreds of flights delayed or cancelled. Twenty four alleged conspirators arrested in East London thames Valley towns Birmingham Many of them described by Neighbours As bearded muslims wearing traditional dress. Shocking revelations that they had a new technique for blowing up to 10 aircraft on the heavily travelled . Routes out of the sky simultaneously by smuggling explosive liquids aboard. All Cabin baggage banned on flights out of Britain. And in a classic Case of panic envy the . Department of Homeland Security declares a red Alert in the United states too. That should scare the Public into supporting the War on terror a bit longer even if the real wars Are about something else Are going seriously wrong Iraq sliding into civil War the Taliban coming Back in Afghanistan Israel flattening Lebanon without making any significant Dent in Hezbollah a capabilities. Most people will assume that with All that smoke there must be some fire. Of course there a some fire. Terrorists of various sorts have been in Busi Ness for about 40 years the current crop of islamist terrorists Are especially dangerous since they Are willing to kill themselves along with their victims. But in the United states More people die on the roads every sin Gle month than islamist terrorists have killed since the year 2000, in Britain its More people every week. Yet neither country has tried to restrict after All Access to cars. Its Only 160 maybe its cynic years since Cal but there Are Strong grounds for nitroglycerine suspecting that this was is All a charade. If invented they infiltrated these terrorist cells Many months ago have now have arrested most of the members then Why would they Institute drastic new Security Mea sures on flights at this Point did they really Only realize in the last few Days that explosives come in liquid form As Well British Home Secretary John Reid boldly asserted that the main players had been accounted for Scotland Yard Deputy commissioner Paul Stephenson proudly announced that we Are confident that we have disrupted a plan by terrorists to cause untold death destruction com Mit mass Well done lads ? but if you have them All locked up Why Are you closing the airports bring ing in All these draconian Security measures now a couple of months ago when you first uncovered this plot but did to know All the main players i could understand such drastic pre cautions but Why now maybe it was those explosive liquid chemicals they were planning to smug Gle aboard the planes. After All its Only 160 years since nitroglycerine was invented. Its a Mere 11 years since Al associate Ramzi Yousef plotted to blow up 12 airliners flying across the Pacific at the same time with Nitro carried aboard in Contact Lens solution bottles. Who could have foreseen this Quick bring in new Security Mea sures they really Arent that stupid. They have been checking liquids that people want to carry aboard flights at Airport Security checkpoints for years. There would be no need for drastic new Secu Rity measures even if the alleged British terrorist ring were still on the Loose. This is All hype designed to frighten the British american Public into supporting the wars of their deeply unpopular governments the War of their israeli ally As Well. Gwynne Dyer is a London based province continues to ignore ideas to improve aboriginal Justice 15wasted years by . Hamilton t Oday Marks the 15th year since the 912-Page aboriginal Justice inquiry report was delivered to Manitoba a minister of Justice. Three a half years Over $2 Mil lion were spent examining How the jus Tice system was serving the aboriginal population in Manitoba. The commission ers finding was that it served them poorly or not at All. Few of the reports hundreds of recommendations have been implemented. The ramp has made major changes by training More aboriginal officers giving them the same authority responsibility As other officers. The Winnipeg police service has made a consistent Effort to improve relations with the aboriginal Community though they have not adopted All the changes the report recommended. New first nation a tis child welfare agencies Are being established. The fact remains that the provincial government has totally ignored the major recommendation of the report ? the creation of a separate court system in aboriginal communities. The Federal government for its part has failed to introduce meaningful self government. The commissioners did not invent the idea of aboriginal courts. At last count there were 225 reservations in the United states with their own court system. We visited a number of them spoke with their non legally trained tribal judges non legally trained prosecutors defence counsel peacemakers who Are assigned by judges to mediate try to resolve some of the criminal cases local disputes. We consulted University professors in new Mexico Washington state. In Reno we attended a course where tribal court clerks were learning How to keep court records conduct hearings How to i panel a jury. The american tribal courts which have developed on Indian reservations Over the years now have unlimited civil jurisdiction Complete jurisdiction Over All but the 16 most serious crimes. They work in co operation with state police state courts. In Oklahoma the state court of Appeal hosts a Confer ence each year where state tribal judges meet to discuss matters of common interest. Compared to the United states Canada is in the dark Ages when it comes to aboriginal self govern ment aboriginal Justice systems. The Canadian punitive approach to wrongdoing is not reducing crime in aboriginal communities. It is not reducing the numbers in jail. The former provincial govern ment did nothing in response to the Aji report. For some strange reason the present government appointed a review commission presumably to see if the Aji report was accurate. It also totally ignored the major recommendation the commissioners made. I was so disappointed by the governments Lack of action that in 2001 i wrote a Feather not a Gavel. In it i discuss from a White persons perspective self government treaties jail populations a variety of other matters. It contains a study conducted by prof. Doug Skoog of the University of Winnipeg which shows the connection Between child welfare practices incarceration in the Penitentiary. The Book made specific suggestions on How local Justice systems can be established in Manitoba. It suggested that aboriginal judges peacemakers be appointed by the communities to work with local police. The families of the victim the offender should be encouraged to participate in resolving problems to assure that any improper conduct not be repeated. The participants the Community will Benefit the offender will be kept out of the regular courts jails. Aboriginal people see that approach As part of their tradition. They would see the result As once aboriginal systems show they work in isolated communities some aspects of them can be introduced in Urban areas. Each aboriginal judge must have the jurisdiction to hear All summary conviction offences except those where the Crown elects to proceed by indictment. That would mean that the majority of crimes will be dealt with in the Community where the offence occurred. The judges would be elected or selected by the Community or communities that establish operate their own Justice system. All of that wont happen overnight but a Start must be made. When the first part of the system is in place communities can go farther establish their own Remote jails which i refer to As Healing lodges. Staffed by teaching elders they can try to Correct an offenders behaviour with traditional teachings. Until changes Are made in the Way aboriginal offenders Are dealt with Manitoba Canada can not expect a reduction in aboriginal crime or the numbers of aboriginal people in jail. I cannot under stand Why Manitoba does not at least establish a Pilot project in the North. It would be Cost effective but More importantly it would be one Way to Start improving life for Canadas first citizens their communities. The aboriginal Justice inquiry did what it was asked to do. It identified problems it showed How Many of them can be dealt with. It has Long since been the governments turn to act. The honourable . Hamilton was a commissioner for the aboriginal Justice inquiry. Israel is the West a Canary in the Coal mine a t the height of the cold War the City of Berlin divided in two by the infamous Wall defined the conflicts very nature. East Berlin was desolate impoverished oppressed but secure in the embrace of communist East Ger Many its soviet rulers. West Berlin was vibrant prosperous democratic but also the most Iso lated Vulner Able pocket of Freedom in the world surrounded on All sides by a hostile totalitarianism protected Only by the Promise of Western nations including Canada that it would never be abandoned never be allowed to fall. As Berlin went so went the West. In june of 1963, just five months before he would be murdered on a Street in Dallas United states presi Dent John f. Kennedy made one of the Best speeches of his Brief presidency. Speaking to a huge crowd of germans in West Berlin he said inspiration ally All free men wherever they May live Are citizens of Berlin therefore As a free Man i take Pride in the words i am a Jelly ? actually what Kennedy said was i Berliner ? which technically does mean i am a Jelly doughnut a partic ular German pastry. He should have said Ich bin Berliner. Fortunately his listeners instincts were better than his speechwriters German they got the message. The whole world got his message about what the defence of West Berlin meant of How vital a sym Bol of Freedom it was. Twenty six years later in november of 1989, the Berlin Wall was torn Down marking the reunification of the City the reunification of the country in a free Germany the end of the cold War. It also marked a change in the world one that everyone initially hoped would be for the better. And for a while it seemed like it might be. But nature As they say abhors a vacuum nature shows that a world without conflict without horror has holes in it that evil will soon Rush in to fill. That is what has happened since the Berlin Wall came Down the soviet Union collapsed. There has been no shortage of wars both big Small raging around the world since then but then there never has been through out history. Some like the rwandan genocide the Slaughter in Darfur in Sudan we choose to ignore or Sim ply address by wringing our hands As if deploring a genocide is somehow equivalent to dealing with it. Others we act on. Canada has seen action in the Balkans Afghanistan although it left Iraq to the americans the British the australians. The one constant intractable conflict on the world scene today however is the War on terror or perhaps More accurately the War that terror wages against the civilized world. We saw it in its starkest bloodiest form in the terrorist attacks on the United states on sept. 11, 2001. We saw it in the bombings in Bali Madrid Lon Don. We saw its threat in an alleged plot to kill prime minister Stephen Harper blow up buildings in Toron to. We saw it this week in the arrest of 24 britons who allegedly conspired to blow up a Bunch of passenger planes in route from England to the United states. Nowhere however do we see it so clearly in its purposefully indiscriminate horror than we do in the Middle East where the War against terror has been going on longer than the cold War lasted. For decades Israel when it has not been successfully defending itself from the armies of its Arab Neighbours in a succession of wars has been try ing to defend itself against palestinian islamist terrorists ? a much More difficult War to win. It is currently involved in an open War with the lebanese terrorist organization Hezbollah which is supported armed by Syria Iran. The fighting has been raging in Lebanon Israel for weeks now. It will almost certainly get worse before it gets better As the International Community dithers Tizzie about what to do. In Europe at the United nations the advice to israelis is to Stop fighting go Home hide in their basements bunkers from terrorist attacks await their Fate. The question what to do should be a no brainer for anyone living in a democracy. Israel is the Only democratic nation in the Mideast the Only nation that does not Foster or tolerate terrorism. If Israel Falls the War against the West by islamist terrorists will spread intensify. Three times in the past islamic imperialism has directly threatened the West three times it was turned Back ? at Tours in 732 a.d., at Lepanto in 1571 lastly at Vienna in 1683. Today militant islam As represented by Al Hezbollah threaten the West once again. Israel is today what Vienna was in 1683. This War is not just about Palestine. Israel today is not just like Vienna just a last line of defence. It is the Berlin of the War on terror it May be that As Israel goes so goes the West. To paraphrase what John Kennedy said in Berlin 43 years ago free people everywhere no matter where they live should regard themselves As Citi Zens of Israel should with Pride proclaim As they stand up for Freedom Western values i am an israeli.?. ;