Kuwaitis get apology from Palestinians (about support for Saddam Hussein)

[Tab]

KUWAIT CITY (AP) — Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas apologized to Kuwaitis on Sunday for the Palestinians' support of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein after the 1990 invasion of Kuwait, making a gesture many here have long demanded as he launched a tour to repair relations with Arab nations.

Asked by reporters about Palestinian support for Saddam's invasion, Abbas responded: "Yes, we apologize for what we have done."

The Kuwaiti government, in a reconciliation gesture to the new Palestinian leadership, had said Abbas was welcome and apologies were not important. Abbas is widely expected to be elected in January to succeed Yasser Arafat, who died in November and had stormy relations with many Arab leaders at one time or another.

However, Abbas' visit remained controversial in Kuwait.

A group of lawmakers said in a statement Saturday that they "absolutely reject the visit ... before the PLO offers an official apology to the Kuwaiti people for the sin it committed against Kuwait."

It wasn't immediately clear if Abbas' brief remarks at the airport would satisfy the lawmakers.
More: http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2004-12-12-abbas-kuwait_x.htm

[lesterhalfjr]

1. they deserved this apology

I just finished reading a book called "lost on earth". It's excellent, about the 90's refugee problem. What Saddam did in Kuwait was horrible. Rape, Pillage, and plunder. it's very much to the US's credit that they did something about it, whatever the motivation. What was done in the name of "arab nationalism" was nothing more than an occupation of th worst most blatantly imperial sort. To their credit, the kuwaitis managed to run over quite a few iraqi soldiers with their cars late at night.

[daleo]

2. How does it compare to what Bush has done in Iraq? n/t

[wuushew]

3. How ethical of us to kill 100,000 Iraqi conscripts

Was freeing Kuwait worth the price of killing so many military slaves?

All life is equal right?

[Name removed]

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[sandnsea]

5. because one book says so?

You remind me of a friend who expounded on how absolutely sure he was that Mike Tyson was guilty... based on a book by the prosecutor. Well I would hope the prosecutor could write a convincing book. Wouldn't be much of a prosecutor if he couldn't.

Your opinion may well be right, but read more than one book to decide.

[Name removed]

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[Bono71]

9. Unbelievable...

Just because we dislike (or in many cases HATE Bush, Jr.) we now are tacitly approving of Sadam's brutality of another country?

Good grief.

That appeasement thing worked so well in 1939.

I don't like the present president, or the invasion (2nd) of Iraq...but it is hard to condone what Hussein did in 1992. Many democrats supported the first gulf war and later the operations in Serbia (how many "innocent" Christian Serbs did we kill protecting Muslim Albanians--are you outraged by that?)...sometimes you have to make difficult choices...

[livinbella]

7. You are citing a 'vanity press' tome as an authoritative source!

Why not quote "Rambo III - The Outtakes" as your backup source while you're at it.
Plenty of tear jerking action-packed fiction there, as well.

[daleo]

6. I actually agreed with the necessity for the Gulf War

At the time, I felt the principle of the sovereignty of states had to be paramount to ensure world peace, even though many states had been put together as a result of colonialism and imperialism, including Kuwait. So, I agreed with Bush I's actions on that account.

Naturally, though, Bush II overturned that principle when he invaded Iraq a second time. It just shows that even if you find you go along with conservatives on some point of principle, you can't trust them as they will betray that principle when it becomes convenient anyway.

[Bono71]

10. Agree 100%

[Name removed]

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[eridani]

12. It wasn't necessary. The THREAT was necessary,--

--but Saddam had already agreed with the Russians that he would quit demanding 'linkage' with Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank as a precondition. The war was actually fought to prevent him from pulling his army out intact. Google 'highway of death' + Iraq for the gruesome details of mass slaughter of an army that was attempting to run away.