April 18, 2005

Chief sorry for letter about Jews The chief of the Roseau River Anishinabe First Nation has apologized to Jewish people in Manitoba and Canada for any anger or hurt caused by a letter he sent to the media last week. On Monday, (Chief Terrance) Nelson said last week's release was a late-night rush job and he should have reviewed it more closely before releasing it. Nelson made critical comments about news organizations he said were owned by Jews. In the letter, Nelson claimed Jews control Canadian media and ignored First Nations issues. He singled out CanWest Global Communications; its owners, Winnipeg's Asper family; and their newspaper, the National Post, as "the voice of Jews." [CBC | Manitoba News] 2:50:46 PM

Mystery Flight: Two passengers trigger alarms—and fresh echoes of 9/11. (Newsweek April 25 issue) Was it a plot? KLM Flight 685 shows it's hard to tell the good guys from the bad. The names of two Saudi passengers aboard the KLM flight had begun producing "hits" on the screening center's lists of 70,000 suspect foreigners. One of these hits—from an FBI database of terror suspects known as TIPOFF—smacked investigators right between the eyes. The two Saudis, the database reported, were brothers and pilots who had attended the same Arizona flight school as 9/11 hijacker Hani Hanjour. 2:39:36 PM

The Professor at Intapundit: THIS IS INTERESTING, even if it's buried at the end of a story on something else: The U.S. military reported Saturday that a CBS News stringer detained after a gunbattle between U.S. forces and insurgents this month "tested positive for explosive residue." "Multinational forces continue to investigate potential collaboration between the stringer and terrorists, and allegations the stringer had knowledge of future terrorist attacks," said Sgt. John Franzen of Task Force Freedom in Mosul. It's going to be bad for journalism, if people get the idea that major-news correspondents may be terrorist moles. 9:43:41 AM