Biological Warfare - the deliberate use of disease-spreading microorganisms, toxins, etc. - has been used by humans for centuries. For example, when they invaded the Americas, Europeans used it very effectively to kill off large portions of indigenous populations. At that time, the main vehicle used to spread smallpox and other deadly diseases among the Tribes was the blanket. Resulting from this, many Natives today consider a gift of a blanket from a white person to be an act of gross insensitivity.

During the World Wars, American and European Nations finessed the art of creating and delivering biological monstrosities, and have spread the expertise around the world to the extent that gas masks have become standard equipment for armies. The use of mustard gas, anthrax, etc., during conflicts became common. Some regimes, notably Iraq, have even used the monstrous war tool against domestic populations.

More recently, during the long brutal years that its black population suffered degradation under apartheid regimes, South Africa's biological warfare scientists were ordered to develop a "pigmentation weapon" to target only black people. The political mentality behind an order to develop such a demonic weapon is so sick that one has to look back in time to the Nazis in order to find something vaguely similar. During the Holocaust, Dr. Joseph Mengele conducted government-condoned genetic experiments at Auschwitz. South Africa was widely condemned for aping the Nazis.

Today, thank God, most of the world's Nations have developed a conscience and have decreed that such demonic weapons should be outlawed. Most are now engaged in destroying vast stockpiles.

But rouge Nations, notably Iraq, are retaining and improving their weapons. In Iraq's case, the United Nations has reacted by imposing economic sanctions. These sanctions have been so effective that widespread famine and hardship are rife among the Iraqi people. Children are suffering malnutrition and the population's life expectancy has been considerably reduced. The Iraqi people are being victimized by the UN for the actions of a madman, Saddam Hussein.

The current hardship situation in Iraq could have been averted if George Bush had finished the Gulf War by removing Saddam from office, preferably by death. One excuse I've heard him make for not doing so was that Saddam would have been replaced with a clone. Such a conclusion is easily rebuked. Brutal monsters such as Hitler, Saddam, Stalin, Idi Amin and Pol Pot are not the norm, but are rare, and deviously intelligent and conscienceless psychos born at random. They rose to power by insidious means and saw no wrong in using cruel means to keep it, including the massive slaughter of their own citizens. Thankfully, they are rare!

My rehash of the before mentioned was caused by reading this horrific news item in the Halifax Herald "Israeli weapon would kill Arabs, spare Jews." Yes, the country created from the ashes of the holocaust is engaged in the unthinkable: developing a weapon capable of ethnic cleansing.

The concept of a Jewish state, which largely owes its existence to the ethnic cleansing of Europe's Jews by the Nazis, being involved in such a horrific enterprise is mind bending. Dedi Zucker, a member of the Israeli Parliament who denounced the research, put it this way: "Morally, based on our history, and our tradition and our experience, such a weapon is monstrous and should be denied."

There is no excuse imaginable for the development of a weapon that can target the extinction of an ethnic group - not even the survival or renewal of a Nation. In the Americas, for instance, the development of a biological monstrosity capable of sparing those with Native American blood in their veins would offer the only hope for our people to reclaim our continents. However, the concept of killing off several hundred million non-Native Americans to realize such a state is a concept that could only be condoned by a mentality bred in Hades.

Therefore, we, the daughters and sons of these persecuted Nations, have had to accept that the horrors of the crimes against humanity committed in the Americas by Europeans cannot be reversed. However, the descendants of the invaders must also accept the reality of what occurred and negotiate a deal which will someday see justice prevail for Native Peoples.

If peace is ever to prevail in the Middle East, this type of thinking also needs to be utilized by Israel and the Arab States. These Nations have to accommodate themselves to the reality of the existence of each other, not pine for what existed 2 or 3 thousand years ago. If sanity prevails, a solution can be found that will permit both groups to live side by side in harmony and have a prosperous existence. Attempting to devise an evil way to exterminate one side is not a solution - it is the dream of madmen.

So, where is the international outcry against Israel for dabbling in such abhorrent experiments? The fact that the country arose from the ashes of the holocaust does not mean that it should be granted immunity from criticism and not be held accountable for its actions. Therefore, lets see Canada take a lead role in condemning it for involving itself in such a repulsive task, and demand that it immediately halt its ungodly experiments!

Daniel N. Paul