​​​​​​​EMPIRE by Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri. Pub: Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, USA, and London, UK, 2000. Pp: 478. Pbk: $18.95 / £12.95.

Addressing the General Assembly of the United Nations on November 10, US president George W. Bush did something that no US president has ever done: he used the word “Palestine” to describe the emasculated Palestinian ‘state’ that the US and Israel would like to set up in the West Bank and Ghazzah as part of a ‘peace settlement.’

When Allah’s final Prophet (saw) gained the power to exercise authority and influence over the society of Madinah the Jews in that society realised that they were in no position to oppose him, at least during these times of fervent popular support for the Prophet among the Ansar of Madinah.

It is often alleged, both in Pakistan and in the west, that “Islamic fundamentalists” wield too much influence, grossly out of proportion to their actual support in Pakistan. It is further alleged that the ‘virus’ of fundamentalism has even infected the military in Pakistan.

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), long regarded as a powerful regional pact that served as an independent voice for the region, ceased to be so on November 5 when its leaders caved in to western pressure.

While America has couched its ‘war’ on Afghanistan in the language of morality, more sinister motives are at work: desire to control the Caspian Sea’s oil and gas, as well as the destruction or removal (‘neutralisation’) of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons.

The anthrax outbreak in the US has put many on edge about biological warfare and ‘bioterrorism’. Anthrax has killed four people and made 13 others ill since it appeared in the US in late September.

The massacres of Palestinian women and children in the Sabra and Shatilla refugee camps nineteen years ago, during the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, brought the camps into public consciousness.

Northern Alliance troops were reported to be moving south through the Afghan countryside towards Kabul on November 11, two days after their capture of Mazaar-e Shareef from Taliban forces.

As if not to be left out of the big league, the Canadian government has introduced a bill in parliament, called Bill C-36, that threatens to remove the freedoms individuals currently enjoy in the country.

US plans for attacking ‘terrorist bases’ in Somalia as the next stage of the ‘war on terrorism’ are well advanced, according to media reports that quote US intelligence and military officials.

Sudanese president Omar Hassan al-Bashir’s must have winced earlier this month when he heard that George W Bush, his American counterpart, has decided to extend by another year unilateral US sanctions against Sudan.

Immediately after the September 11 attacks, Turkey offered its airspace and military bases for use by the US and its allies in their ‘war’ on Afghanistan, reaping ample praise for its “loyalty to the West”.