El País, Pots And Kettles

Eamonn McDonagh
Z-Word Blog
20 February '10

El Páis of Madrid is a wonderful newspaper. In the lead editorial of today’s edition it fearlessly condemns the supposed assassination by Israel of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh.

As well as being legally reprehensible and morally unacceptable the policy of selective assassination, or to put it another way, the dirty war only contributes to the illusion that there are alternative solutions to the one that Israel will sooner or later have to face: an end to the occupation and the opening of talks with the Palestinians on the basis of a two state solution.

Stirring stuff. Spain is a member of NATO and has a large contingent of troops in Afghanistan. Those troops regularly kill members of the Taliban and - as do all troops faced with the challenges they are faced with - regularly kill civilians too. No doubt tomorrow’s lead editorial in El País will call for the immediate withdrawal of Spain’s contingent in Afghanistan on the grounds that its activities in that nation are legally reprehensible and morally unacceptable and are doing nothing to address the root causes of violence there.

Spain is an ally of the United States. As I write this post there are American UAVs prowling the skies of Pakistan and Afghanistan looking for leaders of the Taliban to assassinate.

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