Bush speech on ME democracy draws scorn

[Darranar]

US President George W Bush's call for greater democracy in the Middle East has drawn rebukes from some Arab commentators who accused him of ignoring Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories.

In a wide-ranging foreign policy speech in Washington on Thursday, Bush said the US strategy of supporting non-democratic Arab leaders over the past 60 years had been a failure and challenged Syria, Iran and even key ally Egypt to adopt democracy.

"Sixty years of Western nations excusing and accommodating the lack of freedom in the Middle East did nothing to make us safe, because in the long run stability cannot be purchased at the expense of liberty," said Bush, speaking to the National Endowment for Democracy.

Khaled al-Maeena, editor-in-chief of the English language Arab News daily in Saudi Arabia asked how Bush could call for greater freedoms while ignoring Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories.

Al Jazeera
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I/P is a good start; however, Saudi Arabia, Uzbekistan, Pakistan, and Egypt are excellent continuations of this new doctirne of freedom...

Not that he's going to act. Free elections means that American puppets will lose out. And, of course, he himself wasn't elected in the first place.

[Classical_Liberal]

1. Bush or the people behind Bush have no integrety or morals

They are cynical lying people who care for nothing but power. If this hypocritcal speech doesn't prove it, the Jessica Lynch story does. Maybe stupid people can't be evil, but they can clearly be instruments of evil.

[RuB]

2. Arabs in the M.E. are the last ones to be lecturing us.